The Wrap founder and EIC Waxman accused of demeaning staffers

Sharon Waxman

Justin Baragona and Diana Falzone of The Daily Beast write about the workplace culture at entertainment industry publication The Wrap, where founder and editor in chief Sharon Waxman is accused of demeaning behavior.

Baragona and Falzone write, “The ex-staffer, who said he quit on the spot after that ‘last straw,’ is one of 20 current and former TheWrap staffers who spoke to The Daily Beast about a toxic environment and culture of fear at the highly influential outlet.

“They said Waxman—who was a foreign correspondent, a New York Times columnist, a Pulitzer Prize nominee, and a feared Hollywood reporter before starting TheWrap in 2009—has driven out one staffer after another and left current employees looking for their exits. A majority of the former employees who spoke with The Daily Beast had left the company within the past two years.

“One former staffer compared Waxman’s behavior to an infamously ruthless fictional boss. ‘It was very The Devil Wears Prada. It was really demoralizing and degrading. I would have to emotionally shut down and smile and nod,’ the ex-employee said, referring to the character Miranda Priestly, the tyrannical magazine editor portrayed by Meryl Streep in an Oscar-nominated turn.”

Read more here.

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.