NZ Herald owner NZME plans to cut 38 jobs as it reorganises its news operations.
It called staff into a meeting this morning and told them its plans to "reorganise and resize" its news operations across the national newsroom, including the NZ Herald, BusinessDesk, and Newstalk ZB.
It said it planned to publish and produce fewer stories, to focus on those that engage audience.
It said it would also further invest in video.
Journalists would be grouped into a team-based structure across live news, business, sport, lifestyle and politics. Each would be headed by an editor who would manage the team.
A specialist print team would be developed to cater for print audiences with different needs to the digital audience.
The cuts are understood to be across 14 reporting and 24 production roles. Two Newstalk ZB vacancies would not be replaced.
Wellington's news team would become a single desk, and the NewstalkZB journalists' reporting line will change to the head of radio news and sport. The NewstalkZB and NZ Herald gallery teams would become one, with the number of Herald reporters dropping from five to four.
The job cuts were announced in a webinar fronted by NZME's chief content officer Murray Kirkness at 9.30am.
One NZME worker said Kirkness justified the cuts by pointing out that of the 18,000 stories the New Zealand Herald published in the last six months, 12,000 generated 97% of website traffic.
He said the company needed to publish fewer stories and focus more on the types of content that perform well.
But when pushed on what stories weren't getting traffic, Kirkness wouldn't give a definitive response, the worker said.
"The answer was just evasive. Completely evasive. It's just incredible. They'll know. They're just not prepared to say."
Minister for media and communications Paul Goldsmith said he felt for people losing their jobs.
"Ultimately all businesses need to be constantly re-evaluating how they do their news, how they can make it profitable so they can continue. That's something NZME is working their way through."
He said whether it was the right decision was a choice for NZME to make, and a judgment call. "Everyone is working out how to engage audiences in a different way."
For the newsroom leadership, six roles will be rescoped and a new role created.
This comes a month after NZME confirmed it would close 14 community newspapers impacting about 30 jobs.
The company employs about 300 editorial staff across the NZ Herald, BusinessDesk and Newstalk ZB.
It is understood a number of staff have been called into further, one-on-one meetings to discuss the impact on their roles.
It comes amid a tough time for New Zealand media.
Towards the end of last year, Stuff disestablished video journalist roles in Auckland, while adding new ones in Wellington and Christchurch, cut audio roles, disestablished two senior roles to create a new head of multimedia content and strategy. It severed ties with style platform Ensemble, which it acquired in 2021 as part of a "life and style refresh".
Whakaata Māori brought an end to its daily news bulletin and TVNZ is going through still more cost-cutting.
The industry has been grappling with significantly declining advertising revenue. The Fair Digital News Bargaining Bill, which many had cited as a potential help for the sector, has not progressed as some had hoped.
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