The media industry has been highly disrupted by the internet and the move by consumers to digital media. This has led to major changes in the business models of media organisations. For the March Horizon CIO Podcast, three leading media business technology leaders came together to debate the impact, but more importantly the opportunity, for technology to change the shape of the media.

CIOs from three unique media types joined CIO Community Editor Mark Chillingworth to describe how their sector is changing in shape. Chris Fosberry represented the subscription critical business data sector as CTO of Argus Media, which is a publisher of commodities market data, prices and analysis. Sean Harley CIO of Ascential is also from business-to-business, but this former magazine publisher is now a leading provider of events. Whilst Richard Walsh us Group Technology Director at The Telegraph Media Group, best known for its broadsheet newspaper.

“The media is always reinventing itself,” CTO Chris Fosberry says of the sector and why it is a fascinating place to be a CIO. But as Walsh says: “The media has been one of the first areas to be disrupted over a sustained period of time,” and challenges to the sector continue, whether from social media, citizen journalists or startups.

Throughout the podcast these senior CIOs describe how being a technology leader in the media shares many of the same challenges as sectors being disrupted. Of major interest is how the sector is having to reshape its operating model and adopt multi-function teams models, something that the sector has never been good at. Throughout its history the media has been led by sales directors who have relied upon a divisive “management style” to ensure sales and editorial do not work together. However the three CIOs describe how, as a result of technology, this is changing to a collaborative ethos.

“The pace that we are moving at and the reliance on the digital economy and the data is becoming more and more important and that leads to innovation in structure, the business, your global reach and in the customer sets,” says Ascential CIO Sean Harley.

Tune into listen tor how these three CIOs are dealing with:

Data science
Recruiting data scientists
Business Analytics
Agile practices
Board level operations
Artificial intelligence
Organisational structure
Argus Media
Ascential
The Telegraph Group
Audience
Consumer behaviour
Embed yourself into business teams
Understanding user disciplines in tools usage
Targeted premium services
Qualitative data
Quantitative data
Digital delivery
Listening to the customer
Maintaining a business advantage
AI
Editorial quality
Customer journeys
Marketing
Compelling content
Real-time data
Adding value
Automation
Unstructured data
Natural Language Processing
Advertising revenue
Market volatility
Scaling up the team
Best in class products
Print media
Journalism
Consumer choice

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