WASHINGTON — John Lansing, the new Chief Executive Officer and Director of the U.S. Broadcasting Board of Governors, yesterday outlined strategies he said he is pursuing to move BBG forward. Speaking at a public meeting of the BBG Board of Governors, Lansing listed five priorities:
1. Move aggressively to shift toward digital distribution. Lansing said this would be essential for U.S. international broadcasting to reach and engage with people using mobile telephones, including people who are younger than existing BBG audiences.
2. Enhance cooperation among the five BBG entities – VOA, RFE/RL, RFA, OCB, and MBN. Lansing said he had already created a committee of the directors of all five entities, and they had begun to meet regularly.
3. Enhance the acquisition of content, and shift from day-to-day news to more analysis and “telling America’s stories.” And telling those stories, according to Lansing, will require “curation” – which suggests building relationships with independent journalists outside of the existing Washington staff.
4. Prioritizing use of BBG resources to address “spheres of influence,” including Russia and violent extremism. Addressing the debate over how BBG should address ISIS and Al Qaeda, Lansing said that inside BBG newsrooms, CVE would not be an abbreviation for Countering Violent Extremism: instead it would stand for Covering Violent Extremism.
5. Establishing methods of measuring progress. “We have an excellent impact model,” Lansing said.
Then he added a sixth priority: supporting free and open Internet access throughout the world, which he described as a “natural and important activity” for BBG.
Lansing will answer questions about his new priorities at a CCLP Washington DC Communication Leadership forum on November 2 in Washington.
The complete video of yesterday’s public meeting of the BBG Board of Governors is online here.
There is also a summary of the entire session in a BBG news release here.