New Dow Jones CEO Latour: I will move quickly and decisively

New Dow Jones & Co. CEO Almar Latour sent out the following to employees on Monday:

Hello Everyone,

Today is my first day as CEO – a humbling moment, which comes 25 years after starting here as a news assistant delivering mail and archiving clips.

Over that time period, I have worked with many of you across Europe, Asia and the U.S., be it hunting down scoops, crafting business plans or launching new projects. There are also many of you I have yet to meet, and I look forward to working with you all.

The world is facing unprecedented uncertainty. People have critical questions and they don’t know where to turn for trusted information. That’s where we come in. It is our mission, and our responsibility, to give people the truth, and to harness our more than a century’s worth of knowledge to help our users, readers and customers through their financial, investment, business and life decisions.

It is also a time when more people than ever before crave our expertise, and so we must step up our ambition. We must build on our paid readership and reach new audiences with tailored products for specific markets and to address specific needs.

The highest quality journalism, data and business analysis will always be at the heart of what we do. We must consistently strive to exceed the high expectations of our readers and customers and the millions more we can and will serve.

The last few weeks of lockdown have been challenging. But crises also have a way of giving birth to invention, innovation and change, and your creativity, agility and commitment will be vitally important to our success in the coming months and years.

We have an extraordinary responsibility to protect, guide and grow Dow Jones. The time ahead will require focus and discipline from each of us and everything we do will need to have maximum impact.

We will move more quickly and decisively. We will adopt a nimbler and more flexible work style, and we will sharply reduce red tape to make sure that our resources are pointed in the right direction at all times. We will also work together across business segments more than we have done in the past.

I will give it my all to make sure Dow Jones comes out of this period stronger than ever, encouraged by the knowledge that you are already doing the same. Thank you for your incredibly hard work. I look forward to serving our readers, customers and you.

Almar