WSJ editor Baker: Digital transformation coming in 2014

Wall Street Journal managing editor Gerard Baker sent out the following message to the staff about changes in store in 2014:

As we prepare to ring in the New Year, I wanted to offer my warmest appreciation for all your work in 2013 and to signal our principal objectives for 2014.

It has been a year of transition. At the start of the year, we began executing the final phase of the integration of the Dow Jones Newswires and Wall Street Journal editorial teams. The process is now largely complete and more than 1,800 journalists produce news across all platforms in real time, digitally and in print, for institutional clients and for consumers. Our emphasis on specialization and real-time news gathering is paying off: we have an impressive list of scoops to show for it.

We have achieved our principal ambition – to lead the world in reporting accurately, fairly and objectively on the most important economic, business and financial news. But we have continued to expand our reach by producing some of the best coverage anywhere of broader general, political, international and cultural news and events, and we have published some of the most memorable enterprise journalism in the world.

We have led the way in reporting and analyzing the biggest news stories of the year. No summary account can capture the full compass of our achievements but here’s my own incomplete list:

The Federal Reserve changed policy course and leadership and we were the first to report both, and followed up with the most accurate analysis and interpretation of the economic and financial causes and consequences. As bond, equity, currency and commodity markets around the world grappled with the implications of the Fed’s moves, our reporting and analysis on newswires, Moneybeat, Marketwatch and in the Journal were second to none.

We broke the news of one of the largest corporate deals in history, Verizon’s buyout of Vodafone’s stake in their joint wireless subsidiary. We led the way in coverage of the government’s sustained pursuit of financial institutions, especially the insider trading case against SAC and the multi-pronged enforcement actions over banks’ manipulation of Libor. We were consistently timely and spot-on with our coverage of the healing US real-estate market. Our coverage of the continuing energy revolution in the US that is reshaping global economic and geopolitics was peerless. We covered the turbulence in emerging markets with intelligence and judgment and we reported faithfully and insightfully on the changes in China’s economic and political landscape and on Japan’s continuing struggle to emerge from two decades of stagnation.

We broke big news in the major national and international topics of the year – from the travails of Obamacare to the federal government shutdown, the war in Syria and its fallout in Washington and around the world, the Boston Marathon bombing and its aftermath, the resignation of Pope Benedict and the election of Pope Francis, and the Supreme Court term that – among other landmark decisions – declared same-sex marriage constitutional. Our coverage of Greater New York – especially the New York City mayoral election – was consistently lively and influential.

And of course we produced genuinely groundbreaking works of enterprise journalism. Among the highlights: Trials, an examination of families seeking a cure for desperately sick children; The Lobotomy Files, about the traumas facing WWII vets; and a series of pieces on the challenges facing women in India in the wake of the Delhi rape cases.

These last stories were memorable not just because of their powerful storytelling but because of the way they explored the full possibilities offered by digital journalism.

Our features journalism has never been better: from Personal Journal’s thrice-weekly zeitgeist-forming coverage of everything from personal health to food tastes to the etiquette of office behavior (I hope you have all absorbed the career possibilities afforded by the adoption of the correct power pose). Arena has broadened and deepened our cultural awareness with especially fine and world-leading coverage this year of fine art and books as well as music, television and theatre. Our own Mansion sits at the intersection of cool and smart, and represents the most desirable neighborhood in the world of real estate journalism. Off Duty reasserted its status as the indispensable guide to intelligent and rewarding consumption (bespoke chinos, anyone?) and Review produced thought-provoking, stimulating and often highly entertaining arguments and essays on everything from (mock) advice to new graduates to the case for breaking the strict rules of modern pregnancy.

Meanwhile WSJ Magazine had its most successful year ever, highlighted by the strange and awesome commingling of Gisele Bundchen and Daft Punk. And who amongst us who has even the most casual acquaintance with human physical exertion can now live without the Journal’s Sports coverage; wise, humorous and increasingly global in its scope.

The A-hed continues to be journalism’s best showcase of the quirky, the touching and the downright weird in life: among this year’s finest of the genre, the feline Alaskan mayor rapidly running out of his nine lives.

In video we produced a highly successful series – Start Up of the Year – that some likened (inaccurately but promisingly) to a popular reality show, as well as many memorable productions that enhanced our best journalism and increasingly stood alone as testaments to what can be achieved with powerful visual journalism. The same can be said for radio where we continued to produce lively news coverage on multiple platforms.

The next year will present new opportunities for us to demonstrate the excellence of our reporting and to show our professional agility. As the company continues to roll out DJX, our corporate leadership’s new product for institutional clients, the demand on us in the newsroom to be first with premium stories of economic, financial and corporate importance will grow. And of course we will lead the world in more scoops, better analysis and most penetrating enterprise journalism.

But most important, as I have signaled, in 2014 we will effect no less than a digital transformation of the Journal.

We’ve come a long way in digital journalism in the past year. We’ve presented some of our best journalism in unique ways online. We’ve built a real-time focused news team and will soon revamp our filing and editing to improve the flow of real-time news. We’ve begun work on a major digital politics & policy initiative in Washington, D.C. We’ve hired more visual journalists. We’ve begun making social media and real-time coverage a more central part of the newsroom. We’ve added strength to our search team. And we’ve planned – and begun hiring–for the launch of several major digital initiatives.

Tomorrow, we step up the pace. At midnight, we will welcome WSJD, our new home for vastly expanded coverage of technology and all things digital. We will shortly follow that with the launch of a new iPad edition, and then with a complete redesign of WSJ.com in the spring. We will launch a new digital home, complete with additional digital and reporting staff, for our politics and policy coverage. And we will do the same for coverage of the global economy, markets and finance, arts & entertainment, and China, among others.

Digital and real-time news will truly become the heart of the newsroom, and we’ll make further changes to our newsroom in order to achieve that. The format and focus of our news meeting will change. We’ll add new skills and capabilities to our headquarters but also to bureaus, including new data journalists.

In 2014 we will celebrate the Journal’s 125th anniversary. It will be a fitting time to rededicate ourselves to the task of producing the finest, most reliable journalism, executed for a modern audience in a contemporary way.

I wish you and your families a happy, prosperous and peaceful New Year and I look forward to working with you all as we take Dow Jones and the Journal to new successes in 2014.