Examining the man behind The Bloomberg Way

Andrew Edgecliffe-Johnson of The Financial Times writes about Bloomberg News editor in chief Matthew Winkler, who is the author of its “Bloomberg Way” stylebook and the conscious of the news service as it battles to overcome the perception that it spied on its clients through its terminal.

Edgecliffe-Johnson writes, “The story has left Wall Street asking whether Bloomberg needs a Chinese wall between its editorial and commercial teams, and shone a spotlight on Mr Winkler’s role as the demanding guardian of the newsroom’s culture.

“The bow-tied former credit markets correspondent has set the tone of Bloomberg News’ coverage, from the early days when its advantage lay in its exclusive data about obscure corners of the market, to the Twitter era, when Mr Winkler has highlighted its mission to sort information from misinformation for clients with fortunes at stake.

“The Bloomberg Way, which has grown from a 30-page manifesto into a 376-page book, was ‘a strategy to prove that we could compete with everybody,’ Mr Winkler recalls in a video on Bloomberg’s careers site.

“It says Bloomberg should be the first, fastest, factual, final and future word, and sets down rules on everything from sourcing to the avoidance of the word ‘but.’

“Assembled from his meticulous weekly feedback to staff (emails include lines such as ‘‘most ever’ is redundant’ and ‘Smarter means more, better faster. Seize the day!’), it includes a 660-word Bloomberg-style summary of Genesis (‘The world God created was good. But Adam and Eve – being human – blew it.’).”

Read more here.