The business on...Sly Bailey, Chief Executive, Trinity Mirror
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Your support makes all the difference.Another woman running a newspaper group?
Very observant. But unlike News International's Rebekah Brooks, Sly Bailey (her parents christened her Sylvia) could be about to see a real lift in her fortunes. Analysts believe Trinity Mirror, owner of the Sunday Mirror, as well as a raft of other titles, is the best-placed media group to benefit from the demise of the News of the World.
It's a cut-throat business
You'd better believe it. While most media folk were staring agog at their television screens when the News of the World closure was announced, Ms Bailey's advertising sales force was ordered to hit the phones.
Is she another journalist-turned-manager?
No, Ms Bailey comes from the commercial side of the business. On leaving school, she briefly worked as a shop assistant, but then started selling space at The Guardian. She got her very first management job on this very newspaper, before moving to magazine group IPC in 1989, where she made her name and was, in 1998, the brains behind a £860m management buyout. Three years later, it was sold for £1.2bn.
And then Trinity?
That's right. She's been chief executive since 2003, having been hired by Sir Victor Blank (remember him, the hapless chairman of Lloyds Bank during the credit crisis?).
And has the meteoric rise continued?
Not as such, if the truth be known. Ms Bailey's tenure has been marked by declining profitability and cost-cutting, and she's fallen out with the unions sveral times
That can't have been easy?
Well, her critics would see some consolation in her compensation. Last year's pay package, which totalled the best part of £1.7m, has annoyed many shareholders.
So this crisis couldn't have come at a better time, then?
It's certainly done wonders for Trinity's flagging share-price. But if Ms Bailey doesn't work out how to put the business on a firmer footing for the future, she'll face trouble too.
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