Lena K Samuelsson on Digital Transformation and Journalism’s Future
Lena K Samuelsson spent her entire career with the digital front-runner Schibsted. After a decade in the newsroom of Aftonbladet, she became Editor-in-Chief of Svenska Dagbladet in 2001. In 2013 she joined the International Management Team of Schibsted, as EVP Communications, Brand and CSR. In 2018 she was appointed publisher and Editor-in-Chief of Aftonbladet, the largest digital news destination in the Nordics, and joined the Leadership team of Schibsted’s media division. She now works as an advisor, mentor and keynote speaker and serves on the WAN-IFRA Media Freedom Board.
I have known Lena for quite some time and had the possibility to interview her onstage during our Digital Media Europe conference in 2016 to talk about what else: leading change at Schibsted. So now, 10 years later I had the chance to chat with her as a colleague at WAN-IFRA. I’m sure it won’t be another 10 years this go-round.
Dean Roper: Welcome to your new assignment as Executive Strategic Advisor for WAN-IFRA. You are now becoming a part of a global media organisation – how does it feel?
Lena K Samuelsson: Really good! I look forward to working with CEO stig Ørskov, the management, the board and all the peopel of WAN-IFRA around the world. It’s a fantastic opportunity to influence the largest and most diverse alliance of media organisations in the world, with over 20,000 media brands and tech companies across 120 countries.Impressive to say the least.
I hope to contribute to shaping a strong and energising strategy for the whole organisation and an even greater value for our members. I will also focus on how leadership is a strategic advantage and how the role as a leader is developing and changing in a digital context, something I am very engaged in and have worked with during the last year as advisor, mentor and keynote speaker.
I think my key insight is this: It doesn’t matter how fancy technology you have, how many smart AI tools or how forward-leaning your strategy is.Without an open and digital culture,you will not change a thing.
Like othre titles within Schibsted, and throughout the Nordics, you had this dual duty of Editor-in-Chief and CEO/Publisher at times in your career. How did you make that initial transition years ago when you moved into a publisher role, i.e. no more “separation of church and state!”?
It has been a natural progress as the newsrooms have become more digital. When you lead a digital media organisation, journalism, product and technology, the user experience and business development go hand in hand, all dependent on each other and experienced cross-functional teams.
It takes a village. Especially as digital subscription and user data has become fundamentals of the whole operation,combining the role of Editor-in-Chief with the former responsibilities of a CEO came naturally.
It is indeed also an effect of how many media organisations are moving more into a matrix, where business, product and finance are common functions, which leads to a new type of management structure.
You have been a part of and overseen much of the conversion that took place at Aftonbladet and Schibsted over the years, whether that was embracing paid content models, convergence in the newsroom, and most recently, implementing AI in the newsroom. How did your editor background and that dual responsibility help you to implement change and get buy-in from the newsr