Ben Doody will re-join Journal Register Co. in a few weeks as managing editor of our Connecticut cluster.
Ben is presently digital news editor of Hearst’s Connecticut newspapers, including the Connecticut Post in Bridgeport, the Danbury News-Times, the Greenwich Time and the Stamford Advocate.
Ben Doody
Previously, he worked for JRC as assistant sports editor at The Trentonian in New Jersey for more than three years, and he was chosen as an inaugural member of JRC’s “Idea Lab” thanks to his innovative work there with social media, live blogging and comprehensive local and college sports coverage.
Ben holds a bachelor’s degree in English and journalism from Fairfield University and was editor-in-chief of its weekly newspaper, the Fairfield Mirror.
While still at the Trentonian, Ben started to cross over to become more involved in regular news coverage vs. just sports, and at Hearst, he started out as morning news editor overseeing breaking news coverage statewide before being promoted to a wider digital news role.
In the new role with JRC Connecticut, he’ll help the group editor coordinate statewide news coverage and continue our reorganization around breaking news, community engagement and investigative and enterprise reporting. He’ll also lead the cluster’s transition to redesigned print editions and redesigned web sites and oversee training and career development of Connecticut newsroom staff.
Ben, investigate the corrupt Ct. probate courts and how they exploit the elderly and literally steal their assets.
Excellent! Another body that will produce no content! I don’t know Ben and this is not a knock against him, but really? One more newsroom position in Connecticut that produces nothing?
Why do you bother having editors at each paper if you are not going to let them do their jobs? If you want to improve coverage of local news (you do want that, do you not?), then why not hire two or three reporters instead?
I said it before and I will say it again. Adding to non producing management instead of adding to the “work”force is part of what lead JRC and every other newspaper company to bankruptcy the first time around.
Torrington is getting its butt kicked every day by Waterbury that has 3 or 4 people in Torrington. Torrington has one reporter covering the town. New Haven is getting its butt kicked by the Independent with a staff smaller than Middletown, Middletown can barely produce enough content to fill two pages every day.
Yet you choose to add one more management position.
This might make sense to you, but to those of us who do the work we do not see any sense in this at all.
I wonder if all these “editors” are going to go cover the breaking news they are going to be dealing with? Or, if through aggregation, JRC is going to cover breaking news using other news outlets.
We’ve reduced the number of managers and increased the number of reporters over the past year. This position is not an additional manager, but simply replacing someone who left.
These editors will not be dealing with breaking news. But they will hear about it if they miss any breaking news. Being understaffed will not be an excuse.
I get that you are unhappy with every aspect (at least everything I’ve written about on this blog so far) of what we are doing. However, this is not a “new” position … it’s a replacement for Chris March’s position in New Haven. We have reduced the ranks of editors and managers over the past year, and shifted those positions into reporting/”content producing” positions. And if you think that the newsrooms will run without managers, try experiencing a day or two without them. You’ll find a lot of stuff doesn’t get done and falls apart.
Unhappy? More like completely confused with many of the moves. I thought Chris March was in charge of “disruption”, whatever that is.
Also confused with why you think anyone would think newsrooms would run without managers. Never said that. But there are already managers in every newsroom. They are called editors and I thought their job was to coordinate coverage in their designated areas of coverage. In the last 2 to 3 years it seems they have done a good job of working with one another in coordinating statewide coverage. At least to the extent that coverage has not been turned over to ctmirror, ctnewsjunkie and now a bunch of new columnists.
We need more indians not more chiefs.