एचटी वाले राजीव भाई का न्यू इयर लेटर बांचिए

नए साल पर राजीव वर्मा ने अपने कंपनी के संपादकों-मैनेजरों सबको संदेश भेजा है. आधा काम मैं कर दे रहा हूं, संदेश को यहां प्रकाशित करके. आधा काम आप करें, इस संदेश में छिपे गूढार्थ – न्यूज को पकड़कर नीचे कमेंट बाक्स में लिखने का, ताकि इस मेल की भड़ासी व्याख्या सब तक पहुंच सके. मैंने एक सरसरी नजर इस मेल पर मारी है. पत्रकारिता के कारपोरेटीकरण, मीडिया कंपनियों के मुनाफाखोर होते जाने का प्रमाण है यह संदेश.

इस मेल की भाषा, शब्द, संदेश को पकड़ें. समझ में आएगा कि हम आप जिस जनता जनार्दन, पत्रकारिता के नियमों-सरोकारों, बेहतर समाज और पाक-साफ राज के सपने देखते हैं, बात करते हैं, वो सपने और बातें, सिर्फ हमारे-आपके तक सीमित है. दैत्याकार हो चुकीं मीडिया कंपनियों को सिर्फ एक बात समझ में आती है. वे एक प्रोडक्ट बेच रहे हैं, और उस प्रोडक्ट के जरिए ज्यादा से ज्यादा मुनाफा कमा रहे हैं. इस मेल में एक जगह राजीव वर्मा लिखते हैं- ”We are different from other companies and let us stay that way.”

राजीव भाई से मैं कहना चाहूंगा कि दोस्त, बिलकुल अलग नहीं हो किसी कंपनी से. हर कंपनी में अलग-अलग स्तरों पर चलने वाले भांति-भांति के बौद्धिक मैथुनों का नतीजा ज्यादा से ज्यादा माल बटोरना ही होता है या फिर माल बटोरने की प्रक्रिया को बढ़ावा देना ही होता है और आप इस प्रक्रिया में सफल हैं, लेकिन आपके जो दूसरे भाई बंधु दूसरी मीडिया कंपनियों में सीईओ के पद पर हैं, वे भी कम नहीं हैं. वे भी ठीकठाक मुनाफा अपनी-अपनी कंपनियों को कमवा रहे हैं.

नया साल आ रहा है इसलिए ज्यादा बकचोदी करने का दिल नहीं हो रहा है लेकिन क्या करूं, जब हमें आपको ऐसी कारपोरेट बकचोदियों से दो-चार होने का मौका मजबूरन मिल ही जाता है तो दिल में भड़ास तो पैदा होगी ही और फिर निकलने का रास्ता भी चाहेगी. नए साल में राजीव भाई, एचटी वाले, हिंदुस्तान वाले ज्यादा से ज्यादा माल बेच लें, खूब मुनाफा कमा लें, पाठकों को खूब उल्लू बना लें,  उन्हें उनका काम मुबारक, पर हम तो यही कहेंगे कि भई, मीडिया के नाम की थोड़ी-सी शरम बाकी रखो ताकि कभी जनता या अपनी अंतरआत्मा से मुखातिब होने का मन करे तो आंखें मिलाने भर का साहस मौजूद रहे.

-यशवंत

एडिटर, भड़ास4मीडिया

एचटी-एचएमवीएल वाले राजीव वर्मा का नए साल के मौके पर अपने अधीनस्थों को लिखा गया पत्र…

Dear Friends,

As the year 2010 draws to a close, we enter the New Year with mixed feelings. On one hand is the optimism that is surrounding the economy, which is growing handsomely at 8.5% plus, and on the other hand is a lot of cynicism with regards to corruption and scams that keep springing out of closets each day. It is an occasion, in my view, to take stock of our industry and our company so that we can make certain resolves for 2011.

I have never been more optimistic about the future of HT Media than I am now. Our third quarter is nearly over and since we are a public company, there is very little I can say about it, but I think that anybody who works here can make a very good guess of how we did this quarter. The figures will be released in two weeks from now. That is only one reason for my optimism. It has become perfectly clear to me that several of our new businesses have reached near profit position despite the fact that they were not competing on a ‘Level playing field” either due to late entry or due to subscale investments made in them. I congratulate each of those businesses for the job they have done to close the inequity our competition has enjoyed over our company. This has been possible due to a relentless focus on serving our consumers and our customers and building strong brands.

When we entered 2010, we were faced with a very uncertain environment, not knowing whether the downturn will be double dip or was it ending any time soon. We made investment in personnel, capital equipments, facilities and our brands. We added at least two new factories in Hindi belt, took the company HMVL public, fought a pitched battle in Jharkhand and protected our turf. HT English brands saw post relaunch, a return of our reader franchise in strong numbers in both Delhi and Mumbai. As a result, the much awaited ratification of our strategy and acknowledging efforts of our Mumbai business , the expected outcome  happened when HT Mumbai became second most read newspaper in that market. It has taken us five long years to get there.

Now that we are there, we must set our sights higher to get to the top. Mint also accelerated and grew at a scorching pace. Media planners and customers fancied it as one of the most preferred vehicles for advertising in their segment. This had been made possible due to strong focus on content quality by our Editorial team and building a brand that our readers completely trusted. Mint Money was a fantastic expansion of the already well appreciated Mint brand. Fever 104 and Events merger saw the business taking off with waste elimination to exploit synergies between the two businesses.

Based on creative ideas, a lot of new initiatives that were tried like ‘Ramayana on Radio’, ‘Tree of Wishes’, to Blogs on Radio and Russian partnerships in odd hours which led to business turnaround and becoming profitable within three years of launch. We saw a lot of movement in our Magazines initiative wherein Brunch and Lounge were trying  ascendancy from the position they had inherited, to take advantage of the market opportunity that existed.  HT Burda joint venture saw commencement of commercial production and exports began to Europe as well as Asia.  Online Business also started to make positive progress in a new business that held huge promise for future. Education began incubating a very interesting format of providing the youth supplementary tutoring in Delhi. This was to be our first foray in education space, an entry that  is full of excitement around Study Mate brand.

All this would not have been possible without the strong efforts of back end of our business that has been performing particularly well to support revenue initiatives of Media Marketing. Good and timely production of content, forecasting and planning of quarterly forecasts and a robust Supply Chain have become hallmarks of a solid quarterly performance. Our brand teams have put up a good show with all our brands following the disciplined approach that great marketing teams must haves. The result of all this has been top line growth numbers which are better than our stretch plan and had been eluding us during the previous years. There is of course tailwind that is helping speedup our business but there is also a lot of planning and good work being put up by all team members.

That is the good news. The bad news is that we are doing so well that I am sure, subconsciously, we are becoming complacent. It is the job of the leadership team at HT Media to once again stress the fundamentals of our core enduring values, which I know by now, you all are well aware of. Due to tremendous activities in all phases of our business, every wasteful activity has to be questioned and every wrong action has to be challenged by those of you who are in leadership position in the company. Stay alert!!!! And once again reinforce with your teams to challenge waste and wrong practices. I want us to recommit ourselves to building India’s finest Media Company. Be confident that we have a great organization culture and promote our framework of ethics and values. Our people, i.e. you, are our first line of defense against fraud and waste. We need each and every HT employee’s support to have continued wins in the market place with our readers and our customers.

We are different from other companies and let us stay that way.

I would like to take this opportunity to wish you and your families a very happy 2011 and also thank you all in helping with the mission of building India’s most admired Media Company.

Best regards
Rajiv Verma