Who Now Runs NBC News? Insiders Point to Cesar Conde

AP Photo/Wilfredo Lee

As the dust continues to settle this week over NBC News President Noah Oppenheim stepping down, one trend has become increasingly clear: disruptions in the media business have diminished the role of “news president.”

CNN media reporter Oliver Darcy quoted a former television news executive on the topic, who told him that the “incredible shrinking news president” now dominates the industry.

Stepping into that NBC News void — a void of his own creation — is chair of NBCUniversal News Group Cesar Conde, whose reorganization of the network’s upper management has both raised eyebrows and led to the conclusion that the job of network president no longer exists.

“A closer inspection of the new org chart revealed, however, that Conde was actually eliminating a layer of management, consolidating power, and effectively promoting himself,” wrote Puck’s Dylan Byers of the changes at NBC News. Conde achieved this by splitting Oppenheim’s role into three different jobs, each effectively managing different brands within the business and reporting directly to him.

Byers took a deep dive into the changes roiling the industry and argued that under Conde, who he describes as a CEO’s CEO lacking the “journalistic chops” of his predecessors, NBC News no longer operates as a singular news entity “built around a core television network,” but instead a “constellation of brands.”

“Cesar isn’t thinking about one coherent editorial strategy. He’s thinking about systems, about outcomes,” Byers quoted a “high-level NBC News executive” as having told him.

While Byers argued that under Conde it feels like “NBC News is being turned into something smaller,” he also made clear that as more and more people get their news from alternative sources, Conde’s strategy appears to make business sense.

Rebecca Blumenstein, a print journalist and former deputy managing editor of The New York Times, was announced as Oppenheim’s replacement, but in reality, she only takes over some of his role and past editorial influence.

Blumenstein will manage NBC News’s “core newsgathering,” Byers explained, as well as brands like Meet the Press and Dateline, but she will not manage Today nor the Nightly News.

Libby Leist was tapped to run Today and its e-commerce business, while Janelle Rodriguez will now run Nightly News and NBC News Now – the network’s upstart streaming service.

Byers, whose reporting extensively quotes NBC News insiders, explained Conde’s masterplan, writing:

In this worldview, NBC News is less of an operating business and masterbrand than a holding company for its consumer-facing properties—a multimedia Conde Nast or LVMH or MacAndrews & Forbes.

“The appointments of Rebecca, Libby and Janelle provide a powerful foundation for the News Group as it continues to grow its leadership position,” Conde said in his press release announcing the changes.

Darcy made clear that within this new structure, Blumenstein, Leist, and Rodriguez “will report directly to Conde, making him the ultimate network boss.”

Darcy added that within the NBC Newsroom, the changes led to some “head-scratching” as the venerable news organization was effectively split up.

“NBC News veterans are bemoaning Oppenheim’s departure and somewhat miffed that his pseudo-replacement is a career print journalist who is leveling up while the core television news product has effectively been downgraded,” Byers concluded, adding, “the lack of a single editorial leader to conduct the show suggests, however much spin Conde might want to apply, that the business is less significant, or at least that it will be in the very near future.”

“Of course, there is another way to look at the decision to divide Oppenheim’s portfolio amongst three executives: linear television is dying and the days in which a heavyweight, singular television news executive reigned over a fiefdom are rapidly coming to a close,” Darcy concluded, echoing much of Byer’s sentiment and the ongoing concerns within legacy media operations as fewer and fewer people get their news from traditional sources.