The ARD financial newsroom: from Tagesschau to TikTok
Burghard Schnödewind is head of the ARD financial editorial team. He and his team produce around 40 pieces of content every day: For the Tagesthemen, but also for the Tagesschau and its social media channels as well as for all ARD radio stations. The job is a lot of fun, says Schnödewind, but can also be quite complicated at times. He has a special tip for the next generation.
Werksgelände: What do you actually do as head of the ARD financial editorial team?
Burghard Schnödewind: You coordinate around 50 internal and external employees, work 18 shifts a day, in which between 40 and 50 products are produced for the entire ARD between 4:30 a.m. and 11:30 p.m. for TV, radio, online and social media. The most complicated part of the previous sentence is: „for the whole of ARD”. Try to reconcile the needs of nine state broadcasters and Deutschlandfunk if the topics for tagesschau.de and Tagesthemen are to be agreed on the side. To avoid any misunderstanding: The job is a lot of fun, but sometimes it can also be quite complicated.
What experience or talents should you have for the job?
A little diplomatic skill, a lot of fun working with numbers and a desire to think strategically. You read that right: I didn’t mention journalistic skills, good writing or other editorial skills. Because the truth of my day-to-day work is that I hardly work as a journalist in the traditional sense.
Part of the truth of my day-to-day work is that I hardly work as a journalist in the traditional sense.
- Burghard Schnödewind
What appeals to you about your job?
What appeals to me about economics and the stock market is that they are cross-cutting topics and, above all, economics actually affects all areas. And the stock exchange is not so much a trading place for securities, but a place where information, expectations and hopes are traded. And in the end, it’s all about one thing: money. What appeals to me about „Head of the ARD financial desk” is that we at ARD act like a small company.
What are the biggest challenges in your job?
How do I reconcile the different wishes and needs within ARD? How do we manage to think less and less in terms of traditional broadcasting channels within the editorial team? And more acutely: What’s next for the topic of „press similarity”?
What has been your biggest flop on the job so far, and what did you learn from it?
At the beginning of the 2000s, we had the idea of setting up an information and brokerage platform for investment funds in the former Handelsblatt publishing group. Then came the collapse of the Neuer Markt, the dot.com crisis and 9/11 … I learned from this that journalism is also a business. That the marketing of content is a part of journalism. That editorial offices are also businesses, that our content is a commodity that people buy – even with the time they invest in watching, listening to and reading our content.
Burghard’s tips for the next generation
Let me give you an example: Very few of the trainees at Hessischer Rundfunk decide to do a stint with us in the financial editorial department during their traineeship. The reasons vary: the subject sounds dry at first, and many have avoided economics in their school and university lives. However, we always find that many of the few who come to us like to stay and continue working for us after their traineeship. We have an art historian who now presents business programs. Why all the preamble? The tip for the next generation: be open to new topics, have the courage to explore niches, dare to try something new. Always keep in mind that you are or should be a brand.
Burghard Schnödewind
… is head of the ARD financial editorial department at Hessischer Rundfunk.
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