The FT’s “beauty contest” to find the next editor

FT logo The Financial Times is holding a “beauty contest” to find its next editor after Lionel Barber, reports Mark Di Stefano of BuzzFeed.

Di Stefano writes, “BuzzFeed News has learned that Barber has taken a select group of editors on week-long trips to Tokyo to meet with executives at the financial publisher Nikkei.

“It’s understood that those who accompanied Barber for the so-called ‘beauty contest’ included US managing editor Gillian Tett, editorial director Robert Shrimsley, managing editor James Lamont, deputy editor Roula Khalaf, news editor Peter Spiegel, and Alec Russell, editor of the lucrative FT Weekend.

“‘Lionel wants to introduce the next generation to Nikkei,’ said one senior FT editor with knowledge of the process. ‘He’s running a beauty contest and it’s hard not to think it’s because he’s ready to hand the baton on.’

“Barber, 62, has been in control of the FT since 2005 and successfully led the newspaper through a digital transition, which included putting up a hard paywall around the website. The latest figures from the privately owned company show it has 650,000 paid subscribers to the FT.com.”

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Chris Roush

Chris Roush was the dean of the School of Communications at Quinnipiac University in Hamden, Connecticut. He was previously Walter E. Hussman Sr. Distinguished Professor in business journalism at UNC-Chapel Hill. He is a former business journalist for Bloomberg News, Businessweek, The Atlanta Journal-Constitution, The Tampa Tribune and the Sarasota Herald-Tribune. He is the author of the leading business reporting textbook "Show me the Money: Writing Business and Economics Stories for Mass Communication" and "Thinking Things Over," a biography of former Wall Street Journal editor Vermont Royster.