Good newspaper jobs are hard to come by these days, but you wouldn't
know it from the way people are ditching the ones they have at The Wall Street Journal -- and, in some cases, leaving behind journalism altogether.
In recent days, columnist Jonathan Clements, reporter Laurie P. Cohen and editor Paul Barrett have all resigned from the paper. They follow reporters Anita Raghavan, who jumped to Forbes
as European bureau chief, and Sally Beatty, who has joined Pfizer's PR
department. A Dow Jones spokesman declined to comment on the exits.
Clements appears to be the biggest loss. His personal finance
column, "Getting Going," is syndicated in 70 newspapers, and routinely
makes the Journal's list of most emailed stories.
On April 14, he'll join Citigroup as director of financial education
for a new unit created to advise the "emerging affluent," investors
with less than $500,000 in assets. His duties will involve creating
content aimed at those investors, including blogs, columns and videos.
Even though it could be construed as a form of marketing, he sees the
task as very much in line with what he's been doing at the Journal:
"I have no intention of sacrificing the principles I've spent the last
two decades advocating, and Citigroup hasn't asked me to do so," he
says.
Clements adds that Rupert Murdoch's takeover of the Journal
had very little effect on him personally and wasn't a factor in his
decision to leave. "I'm 45 and it's time for a change," he says. "I
recently wrote my thousandth column, and if somebody told me I had to
write another thousand, I'd go out back and blow my brains out."
Meanwhile, Cohen (who briefly worked at Portfolio) left to join a hedge fund, according to sources, while Barrett returned to BusinessWeek after what was only a three-month stint at the Journal. Reuters media reporter Robert MacMillan also had a blink-and-you-missed-it Journal tenure recently, and now he's back at his old home, covering the paper where he worked a few weeks ago with nary a word of disclosure.
WSJ TO COMPETE WITH ITSELF IN LONDON
Rupert Murdoch has a shiny new toy, and he wants to show it off to his friends in Old Blighty. Beginning April 16, The Wall Street Journal's U.S. edition will be distributed on newsstands in London, where it will compete with -- or, rather, "complement" -- The Wall Street Journal Europe
Physically larger than its European counterpart, the Journal
will have a British print run of 3,500 and a cover price of £2.50.
Would-be subscribers with addresses in central London can also sign up
for delivery.
Of course, those who prefer the "regional perspective and concise
format" of the European edition have nothing to fear, insists Michael
Bergmeijer, managing director of Dow Jones' Consumer Media Group in
Europe: "[O]ur commitment to the European edition remains as strong as
ever." For now, anyway.
UPDATE: Interesting timing -- Forbes just announced it has hired away the Journal's London bureau chief:
Today Forbes announced that Anita Raghavan has joined as the magazine's
European bureau chief, based in London. Raghavan is a 16-year veteran
of the Wall Street Journal, including five years spent working in
London, where she covered the European merger boom. Raghavan began her
career in journalism with Dow Jones Newswires covering capital markets,
and received the Overseas Press Club's Malcolm Forbes Award in 1999 for
her work on behalf of the Journal. She is a graduate of the University
of Pennsylvania, and received her M.A. in Russian Studies from Columbia
University.
