How the ‘why’ of the mission can align the entire business

Many news publishers can simply be aligned by one stated goal, for example: "We will have X number of digital subscriptions by Year XXXX."

That requires a clearly communicated vision. Then there are even higher missions, yes, that 'Why Factor', that can help drive strategy and vision.

"I think the organisations that will achieve success are those that are more strategic, where the organisation is more aligned and the newsroom is aligned and understands vision, mission, you know, why are we doing this job?" said Styli Charalambous of the Daily Maverick in South Africa.

"Why does our journalism exist, and who are we doing this for and thinking of it as a service? In response to the needs of society and how we best do that?"

"When we invested in those foundations, in being more strategic, in understanding our audiences better, doing data right, and creating a culture of innovation… When we set out to do that, it was a long project, 2 to 3 years - and it's still ongoing.

"But we have seen amazing results. There was a lot of clarity. There was less duplicated effort. We were able to stop doing things because they just weren't aligned with any of our key goals or our priorities."

Positively influencing society as a core mission: That is Nation Media Group's core mission statement, and NMG does its part by ensuring that those are not just words but that, in addition to its content, many of its specific investments, partnerships and projects reflect that mission.

Monicah Ndung'u, the Chief Corporate Affairs and Partnerships Officer at NMG in Kenya, said that guiding principle is baked in all of the group's decisions. On a continent where the average age is 19, much of NMG's products, services, verticals and content are focused on youth, but more so what NMG refers to as the "Gen Z effect."

"Essentially, this is the effect younger people are having across all generations," she said. "So while we may be focused on young people, the bigger thing to look at here is the GenZ effect, the young audiences who are mobile-first. They are authentic, they interact with content, they are trendsetters. You cannot underestimate how they are influencing other generations in how they consume media - and the impact that has on our journalism and the communities we serve."

"I told you about the tapestry of this beautiful continent we come from, called Africa," she said. "East Africa is not any different, but as we look at platforms, as we look at audiences, and as we look at what we can do to drive business sustainability, our biggest bet remains how we can remain trusted, relevant, provide depth and context regardless of vertical platforms or tools. And it all comes back to impacting society in a positive way, every day."

The balancing act

Xenia Daum is the CEO of Kleine Zeitung in Austria. She took over as CEO in 2023 with a clear mandate to transform KZ from a very print-centric news organisation to a more digitally focused one, something that many publishers are still struggling with today.

"The greatest challenge has been balancing transformation with day-to-day operational demands," Daum said. "You can't pause the business while redesigning it, so we've had to learn how to innovate while still delivering excellence every day. In particular, driving cultural change while maintaining trust and stability in the newsroom has required thoughtful, consistent communication and a lot of listening.

"And change is difficult because you always have these people who are eager and curious to do something new and change, and then there are people who say, 'Okay, I understood this. Tell me what to do and I'll do it.' And then you have this group of people who really fight hard with changes, new processes, new situations - all the way down to things like table positions in the newsroom."

Kleine Zeitung is indeed an established brand in Austria, with more than 250,000 subscribers (print and digital). But Daum admits that KZ is still quite a print-focused organisation.

"And so this is our big challenge to make a big digital transformation leap in the future. Pointing to the slide above, she continued, "This is K2, who remembers it? It's our project for the future. It's our road to 2033. To become a real digital brand, a digital media house. And as you all know, this is a very tough way to go. Right now we are still in the base camp, so a long way to climb."

Riding Schibsted's ongoing cycle of change

Lisa Irenius is no stranger to change. At the end of 2023, she took on the dual role of Editor-in-Chief and CEO at Svenska Dagbladet in Stockholm, after previously serving as the national daily's Culture Editor. Quite a shift in job roles. And SvD is owned by Schibsted, which is renowned for its digital transformation industry inspiration.

But if you have also followed the media group's development, it has undergone major change in governance in the last few years. And not too long after Irenius took over as CEO of SvD, Schibsted announced it was split into two companies: Schibsted, owned by The Tinius Trust, and Schibsted Marketplaces, a publicly listed marketplaces company (recently renamed Vend). That level of change lingers…

As if that major group restructuring and new job role were not enough, SvD was in the midst of planning its own restructuring, Irenius said.

"We hadn't originally planned to reorganise Svenska Dagbladet at the same time as the major restructuring now taking place within Schibsted, but the timing Svenska Dagbladet's new newsroom organisation happened to coincide," Irenius said. "In some ways, it's actually easier when changes happen at the same time - it makes it even clearer that we're rebuilding together to create even better conditions going forward. We already have a strong culture of collaboration within Schibsted Media, and I see a genuine willingness to work more closely and support each other."

Previously, SvD's newsroom was organised into 17 departments, and now (the day before Irenius spoke at Congress) it has shifted to working in six hubs or areas of collaboration, which reflect key focus areas for SvD. These hubs will consist of smaller, self-organising teams, each with a permanent "special projects" team, to drive more agility.

One example, SvD created a hub called Growth, which brings together editors, reporters, project managers, as well as expertise in UX, data analysis, and product development, ultimately to invest more in new projects for digital growth, she said.

She admits, however, that communicating such a change brings its own set of challenges and pain points. "It's been an intense year, and, while it is important and interesting to work with organisational questions, it can also be a bit frustrating because you want to focus on journalism."

'Show, don't tell'

For such a sweeping change, Irenius said there were many new job roles created and they had to go through a process of having journalists apply, talk with their different managers and so on. "The key to all of this was to do this together. You will never make everybody happy, but if you do it together, most tend to get on board.

"You obviously have to listen to people, but you can't really just tell people about change… it's also more about show, don't tell," she continued. "In today's environment, you have to experiment so it's all about getting team members and journalists onboard to take on an interesting project. To show that 'we did this and we learned this.' Then you are more likely to see a colleague working on that project share their experience with another colleague, and that is much easier, and perhaps even more impactful, than having a top manager coming to say you should be more innovative."

Much of staying ahead of the curve has been baked in the DNA of Schibsted going back to the late 1990s.

"I think that is an important part of the Schibsted culture, that flat culture that not only allows or enables staff to see opportunities for growth, it can also be inspiring. I mean, that's maybe why I'm here (in this position as CEO)… that you dare to take a culture editor and see what happens if given the opportunity."

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This article is an extract from our report World News Media Congress Playbook: 7 priorities where publishers must excel, which summarises key learnings from more than 120 news executives who spoke at the World News Media Congress in Krakow in May 2025. WAN-IFRA Members can download the report from our Knowledge Hub.

WAN-IFRA Staff

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