Women Of Excellence: Susan Grant
Executive vice president, CNN News Services
Tim Darnell
July 1, 2008
sponsored by:
W
hen asked if the future of her industry is on TV, through the Internet, on the iPhone or
through some form of delivery that hasn’t even been invented yet, Grant enthusiastically answers, “
Yes, all of the above.”
Grant says that CNN wants to be the information platform wherever you are. “If you want it on your phone or your Blackberry; we can come up with icons for your iPhone; we have video on demand … At the same time, we want people to know that Anderson Cooper is hosting a show at 10 p.m. on TV. So I feel certain that one day we’ll all be able to get our news and make toast at the same time.”
As executive VP of CNN News Services, Grant oversees a division of CNN Worldwide, which encompasses the company’s digital and affiliate businesses. She’s led CNN.com to its present status as a No. 1 news and information site, according to Nielsen Online. Under her tenure, CNN.com unveiled an integrated Web site that puts users within a click of the global, national and local news and information they find most relevant. And CNNMoney.com continues to grow as one of the world’s largest business Web sites.
In a journalistic market in which even YouTube could be considered competition, “our No. 1 challenge is to stay relevant,” Grant says. “You have to understand your audience and focus your business on those consumers, people who want relevant news and information. If you focus on what you do well, you’ve put yourself in a competitive situation. That’s what we’ve learned since the hubris of our early days.”
And Grant was there at the beginning, when Ted Turner launched the concept of a 24-hour cable news network. She was its first director of public relations in 1980, and later became CNN marketing manager.
“When we started we were a great idea that we knew was going to work,” she recalls. “Now we’r e a successful news organization; we’ve realized the vision, and now we’re running it like a company. My boss, Jim Walton (president of CNN Worldwide), says good journalism is good business. We’ve been able to marry the mission of being a journalistic organization with being a good business organization.”
Even though female anchors have been in front of the camera for generations, Grant says women have gone “from having one seat at the management table, to two seats. And I look forward to the day when those seats don’t simply represent the female point of view. This process has taken much longer than I thought it would have. But it’s not a glass ceiling, and some of it we lay on ourselves and need to address ourselves.”
“Susan’s successes speak for themselves – growing CNN’s affiiliate business to more than 800 local stations, overseeing CNN.com’s emergence as the No. 1 news and information site on the Web, the list goes on,” says Jim Walton, president of CNN Worldwide. “But what I can tell you about Susan that you might not be able to tell from her resume is that her determination, enthusiasm and passion are enviable. She has nurtured and grown several mere ideas at CNN into important, viable businesses; but she’d never take credit for it – she would only point to her team. She’s humble, smart and gutsy; and we’re better for her being here.”
Grant serves on the board of directors for Internet Broadcasting, the nation’s largest publisher of TV station Web sites. A graduate of Leadership Atlanta’s Class of 2006, she served on the board of directors of Zoo Atlanta for 10 years, holding the position of chairman of the board for two years. She also served as chairman of the National Association of Television Program Executives and is a member of the Atlanta chapter of the International Women’s Forum.
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