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We live and work in exciting times - revolutionary times. Technology continues to recast the media industry.

The extraordinary advance of affordable personal digital technology and the stellar rise of social networks are both distrupting and transforming the media market making this a unique moment to be involved in the convergence sectors we focus on.

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Thursday, 12 February 2009

ITV freezes high-earner salaries - prudent or superficial?

ITV continues to deal with the impact of the unprecedented cash crunch driven by advertising revenues plunging steeply, announcing a salary freeze for all employees earning over £60k.

On the plus side, it shows that the management team are not afraid to take tough decisions, making an example of the 10% who are classified as "high earners" and saving a quantifiable and significant sum of money.

On the negative side, there is always a risk in de-motivating the very people who should be the talent to drive the business to success in these tough times, where the commercial dynamic has to be changed to enable ITV to survive.

There is also a view that this actually isn't going far enough. With KPMG and other large professional services businesses asking staff to work a 4 day rather than 5 day week, or take 3 month sabbaticals on 30% of pay, there is a view that ITV could have gone further to secure its own future.

On the back of other recent news at ITV, it can't be a positive place to be right now. It's not quite in the same commercial bracket as the Independent yet, but the next 6 months will be critical to its survival.

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