For more than 10 years, the NAA Foundation’s Digital Media Leadership Program has had an ambitious goal: to identify and develop women and people of color who could be among the next generation of digital media leaders. To do so, 10 people with strong digital experience and significant responsibilities are selected each year for the fellowship and given a thorough grounding in digital operations.
The 2008 fellows included sales, research and content managers. As in previous years, while the fellows attended some workshops, the main learning came from working on a months-long project. They were divided into two teams and charged with creating a strategic business plan for the digital operations of a newspaper. As a result, their team-building, communications and time-management abilities were enhanced, and they developed the research and analytical skills necessary to evaluate new audience development and revenue opportunities.
“We each worked from our strengths and pulled together to fill in the rest,” says Susan Eggenberger, online product and sales manager for the Milwaukee Journal Sentinel. “We also learned to work through our own time constraints while staying focused on completing our project.”
Both of the 2008 teams focused on a mid-sized market: Greensboro, N.C. One team developed a plan for a vertical Web site, while the other did the same for a social networking site. Proposals for both groups included a mobile component as well.
In my view, both teams excelled. Team One proposed a comprehensive and interactive Web site for everyone involved in youth sports, while Team Two pitched a social networking site that could augment a vertical Web site being contemplated by The News & Record in Greensboro.
“In the end, we had a finished proposal that we can use as a guide at our own companies should we be asked to do something similar,” Eggenberger says.
In fact, the Digital Media Leadership Program has a secondary goal – to offer ideas and inspiration to other digital media managers. In that spirit, the fellows’ proposals are shared below.
Team One: Sportsboro, "Where The Athletes Go"
Team Two: Social Networking at The News & Record