Failure is Way to Success, Says NYT CEO

The New York Times' decision to introduce an online pay model ranks as the "most important and successful decision" made by the company in many years, CEO Mark Thompson told Columbia Business School's commencement ceremony held May 19.

That decision, which pre-dated his ascension to the helm, was faced with "initial widespread skepticism," but now has the rest of the newspaper world scrambling to introduce their own online pay editions.

His theme dealt with the importance of risk-taking and acceptance of failure as the price of innovation and "transformational success."

He told the students that following conventional wisdom is an outdated notion in today's "disruptive age."

Thompson's said of the current era: "The disruptive age is one in which the discontinuities outnumber and overwhelm the continuities and in which  predictions based on the past or the smooth projection of current trends into the future frequently prove unsound.

"Conventional wisdom tries valiantly to keep up, to recalibrate in the light of recent developments, but because it cannot foresee transformational breakthroughs or the kind of behavioral and business-model pivots which digital technology makes possible, it never can."

Said Thompson, "In modern media, you could make the case that the best way forward is to listen carefully to what the industry has to say and then do the exact opposite."

To Thompson, the NYT's 700K paid electronic subscriber base and "nine-figure revenue stream" proves as bunk the belief that "people won't pay for news."

The NYT, which embraced digital during the 1990s, has gone through several generations of new online products and services.  "It will need innovators and entrepreneurs every bit as much as digital start-ups down the road and fortunately we have the brand appeal and the creative challenges to attract them," said Thompson.

He likened the digitalization of The Old Grey Lady—which he labeled the transformation of an iconic and precious cultural institution—"as being like skateboarding down a flight of stairs holding a Ming vase."

The paper's success "depends on both on holding firm to unchanging values and on opening ourselves to new and inevitably uncertain business opportunities" concluded the CEO.

Thompson, a BBC veteran, was appointed to lead the NYTC last November. He described his accent as "Bond villain."