Schibsted’s hidden asset: multiple cultures for its media properties

For those analysts and pundits passing judgment on today’s newspaper industry, one of the big strikes against us is a belief that our internal culture is not transferable to the Digital Age.

Most media companies operate singularly when it comes to culture, and that is often their Achilles Heel. Usually, there is a dominant culture – entrepreneurialism, mindless template execution, conservatism, risk-aversion, top-down, Balkanized – that is prevalent at the business unit level. There is usually either a tight connection to a corporate office or a loose connection to a corporate office.

I visited the venerable media company Schibsted in Oslo, Norway, recently. As you know, Schibsted is one of the most progressive newsmedia companies in the world. With operations centered mostly in Europe, the 170-year-old Schibsted has a presence in the newspaper, television, film, online, mobile, book, and magazine industries. The company generates nearly US$2.1 billion in revenue.

The visit yielded an unexpected finding for me. Schibsted is sitting on a hidden asset: multiple cultures.

The asset isn’t apparent until you interact with their various business units. It doesn’t show up in the annual report. It doesn’t show up on their web site. It doesn’t appear in corporate presentations.

Over two days, I visited with the Schibsted corporate office, quality daily Aftenposten, popular daily Verdens Gang (VG) and its digital counterpart VG Nett, and online classified advertising portal Finn.

An interesting picture emerged for me.

Whereas most media companies are looking for synergies around every corner, Schibsted has set up their properties distinctly separate from the other. They seem more aware than others about merging content with platform with audience.

I was surprised that Aftenposten was located at the central train station – a good way of getting often disconnected 40- and 50-something journalists at a quality newspaper to interact with the general public in a very public, earthy setting. The editorial culture appears traditional, which is to say working behind journalism rules and journalism walls. Yet there are advantages and disadvantages to this.

At the popular newspaper, VG, there appeared to be a clearly print side to the operation (populated by 30-somethings) and a clearly digital side to the operation (populated with 20-somethings). The print side was more market-connected than Aftenposten colleagues, but not as much as VG Nett colleagues. Even within VG, the Schibsted influence seems to be to let the digital side fully exploit the digital side – and the same with print.

Still at a third office in Oslo – none of the Schibsted assets are in the same building! – Finn executives are aware of their print roots, yet they talk distantly about them like a history teacher explaining humanity's evolutionary roots. Finn has a distinct sales culture with youngish employees who mix entrepreneurialism with sales with technology. These 20- and 30-somethings like the Finn culture, and don’t churn out.

And then there was the serene Schibsted corporate office where office walls have come tumbling down in recent years. Senior vice presidents sit with other senior vice presidents in open cubicles. Executive vice presidents sit over here, digital people sit over there, and so on. This latest visit was typical: Another large group of up-and-coming young people in the auditorium going through training-and-development, a rarer and rarer site at corporate offices these days.

Meanwhile, I know Schibsted’s Blocket classified portal concept, which they want to export to other countries, is designed to be culturally malleable, too. Same with its 20 Minutes free newspapers in France and Spain, as well as its online classifieds operations throughout Europe.

Schibsted tries mightily to encourage communications among business units, yet they want enough of a disconnection to encourage full business development.

What I couldn’t help wonder was whether a company like Schibsted could take advantage of these multiple cultures. Do you want to cross cultural streams, or leave them the way they are? Could a cultural anthropologist take the editorial brainpower and audience of Aftenposten and inject some degree of Finn or VG Nett culture?

It was refreshing to see Schibsted run on a set of principles, yet allow business units to flourish without the baggage of the one-size-fits-all print culture that has dragged down less formidable companies. They realise that managing a multi-media company can’t be about copying and pasting a print newspaper culture onto assets that have nothing to do with a print newspaper. They especially don’t want to tie an anchor onto the tail of digital operations.

Culture, and how it is applied, can be turned from liability to asset in the proper setting. Schibsted proves that.