Bhubaneswar: Giving a glance towards the Guest of Honour on the dais, the External Affairs Minister S Jaishankar in his address to the 18th Pravasi Bharatiya Divas Youth conclave said big:
"Normally we pick somebody from the political world for that position (guest of honour). On this occasion we have made a departure - I think a very understandable and a very justifiable departure of picking someone from the world of media, from the world of business. Because young Indians today are succeeding in so many domains and it's important that we recognize that...”
Indeed, the decision of the MEA to make a departure from convention seems justifiable as the MAN OF THE MOMENT on dias has been none other Coimbatore born 40-yr old Dev Pragad, who is known in business and media world as the “Turnaround Man.” He is credited with in many case studies by big universities like Harvard as the man who save American dreams from the jaws of death.
Read the inspiring story of Pravasi Bharatiya Dev Pragad, who is now the CEO of American’s throb 91-year Newsweek – the new magazine that began its endeavour in the world of news way back in 1933. Newsweek was regarded as the BIG THREE in America, along with Time and US News and World Report.
Year 2013 (i.e 11 years ago): a strong buzz was growing around in America – Newsweek is dead!
Year 2016: Indian born Dev Pragad joined the Newsweek.
Year 2018: He helmed the hoary Newsweek.
Year 2024: Variety (another big US news magazine) did a story headlined: How ‘Fairness’ Fueled Newsweek’s Rise as the Unlikeliest Digital Success Story of 2024
The above dateline tells the turnaround story crystal clear – from Newsweek is dead to Digital success story of 2024! The decision to make Dev Pragad Guest of Honour at the Odisha PBD summit with theme – “Diaspora’s contribution to Vikshit Bharat” – seems very appropriate.
And as the Youth and Skill Development Affairs Minister Mansukh Mandaviya has said, “The whole idea of holding PBD conclave is to bring the best practices of the NRI’s host countries and implement the same in India to achieve the 2047 dream,” here are the turnaround man’s best practices that compelled Havard to make him a case study!
Introducing him at the 18th PBD convention here, Dev said,
“I was born in India’s Coimbatore in 1984, stayed in India for 11 years. My father was an IIT graduate. We migrated to UK, and I graduated from King’s College in London with a Bachelor in Engineering in Computer Science/Electronics and PhD in Mobile Internet. I also had an executive program from Harvard School of Business. “
HOW HE WEAVES SUCCESS STORY – A LESSON FOR BIG DIGITAL MEDIA HOUSES
Earlier, on his success strategy, Dev had once said,
“I thought we could build on that (despite Newsweek in dire straits. But to do it, we had to restart the brand (Newsweek brand took a severe beating then with alliances and financial irregularities, plus diverting from hard core news to more towards celebrity oriented magazine). And that was a tremendous, and tremendously exciting, challenge.”
First lesson here is to build up your BRAND. And then he spelt the following.
- Educate writers on the fact that there’s no such thing as a great story… if nobody reads it.
- Journalists needed to buy into the reality that data must drive their editorial decisions.
- He said, for example, they had to understand which stories found an audience on the major digital platforms like Google, Facebook and Apple News, and which did not.
Sharing his turnaround strategy in Bhubaneswar, Dev spelt the following which the big digital media houses can count upon to write a success story!
- We seek out partnerships with partners like Google, Engine Media and Statista.
- While Google Cloud helped develop an industry-leading AI recommendation engine, we introduced OKR – objective and key results. This from Google has been a breakthrough, he added.
- Integrated multimedia elements such as videos, podcasts, and interactive graphics into Newsweek’s content strategy.
- Remained committed to maintaining high standards of journalism – reinforced Newsweek’s dedication to investigative reporting and in-depth analysis of global issues.
