Chris Licht’s Memo To CNN Employees: “Together, We Will Double-Down On What’s Working Well And Quickly Eliminate What’s Not”

Ted Johnson
·12 min read
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UPDATE, 9:09 AM PT: In his first memo to CNN employees, the network’s incoming leader Chris Licht praised the network’s coverage of the Ukraine crisis yet did not get into specifics of what direction he wants to take the network.

He wrote, “I know you have a lot of questions. Perhaps the biggest one is how will CNN change? The honest answer is that I don’t know yet. David Zaslav has given me one simple directive: To ensure that CNN remains the global leader in NEWS as part of Warner Bros. Discovery.”

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He wrote that he planned “to do a lot of listening.”

“Together, we will double-down on what’s working well and quickly eliminate what’s not,” he wrote.

David Zaslav, the incoming CEO of Warner Bros.-Discovery, wrote in a separate memo that “I am confident you will love Chris, and that he is the next great leader to move CNN forward to even higher heights all around the world, and on every platform.” Zaslav, too, praised CNN’s coverage of the Ukraine story, and wrote of the legacy of Ted Turner, CNN’s founder, while not mentioning Jeff Zucker, who resigned as CNN’s president earlier this month.

“The legacy of Ted and CNN is long, proud and historic. The stewardship of this incredible organization is an amazing opportunity,” Zaslav wrote.

There has been some speculation that whoever leads CNN next will face pressures to steer it away from opinion and commentary. John Malone, a major shareholder of Discovery, said on CNBC last year that CNN should “evolve back to the kind of journalism that it started with.”

The full memos are below:

Chris Licht

To my future colleagues:

The team at WarnerMedia has been kind enough to allow me to send this brief note.

First, I want to say how honored and excited I am about the plan for me to join the CNN team. I’ve watched in awe how you are covering the still-unfolding Ukraine story. It’s a great example of the power and impact of CNN. It also is proof that you know how to excel at your work during times of crisis.

Under normal circumstances, I would join you in person to introduce myself. However, Discovery has not yet combined with WarnerMedia and I still work for CBS. The current plan is for me to wind down at CBS in a couple of weeks and then join you at Hudson Yards in May, assuming the formal merger is complete.

In the meantime, I plan to do a lot of listening. I am familiar with CNN as a viewer, a journalist, a competitor and the husband of a former CNN staffer. As many of you know, my wife, Jenny, spent more than a decade in a variety of roles at the network. I understand many of the daily challenges you face. My commitment is to foster an environment in which everyone can do their best work and feel supported.

I look forward to getting to know all of you and hearing your candid thoughts and feedback. Our viewers demand the truth from us, and I want to learn the truth from you. Together, we will double-down on what’s working well and quickly eliminate what’s not.

I know you have a lot of questions. Perhaps the biggest one is how will CNN change? The honest answer is that I don’t know yet. David Zaslav has given me one simple directive: To ensure that CNN remains the global leader in NEWS as part of Warner Bros. Discovery.

I am a journalist at heart. While I have enjoyed every minute at “The Late Show,” I am joining CNN because I feel a genuine pull to return to news at such a critical moment in history. CNN is uniquely positioned to be a beacon of meaningful, impactful journalism for the world. I am committed to upholding and building on CNN’s legacy. I am incredibly excited to work with all of you.

See you in May.

Chris

David Zaslav

Good Morning:

I am very much looking forward to meeting everyone in person soon, and wish we could be together to share this news today. With the Warner Bros. Discovery transaction still set to close in early 2Q, we are not yet one company and we are grateful to John and Jason for this chance to connect here today.

As I’m sure you have read, we plan to appoint Chris Licht as the new Chairman and CEO of CNN Global, hopefully starting May 1.

I have known and admired Chris for over 15 years and believe he is the best person to lead this incredible organization. Chris is a dynamic and creative producer, an engaging and thoughtful journalist, and a true news person. He has more than two decades of broadcast experience across local, cable and national news. He has been in the field, in the control room and on the set. He is a highly principled individual who is trusted, hard-working and makes every organization stronger, more innovative, and more cohesive.

First by helping to create and executive produce “Morning Joe” on MSNBC in 2007, then skyrocketing “CBS This Morning” to new success and prominence, and since 2016, building the perennial leader in Late-Night with “The Late Show with Stephen Colbert.” Chris is a formidable, decisive and hands-on leader, a true builder of careers and a nurturer of talent at all levels of an organization. He is also a fighter, showing his own personal grit and determination coming back from a brain hemorrhage documented in his book What I Learned When I Almost Died.

I am a news junkie at the core and was lucky earlier in my career at NBC to play a role in starting CNBC and MSNBC. I have long been a big fan and admirer of CNN with its extended leadership in breaking news, global news, and investigative reporting. The coverage most recently from Ukraine has been extraordinary. The analysis is thoughtful and informative, the reporting compassionate, and the journalism vital. The risk to personal safety is a true public service. You have built and sustained the CNN that Ted Turner first envisioned into the foremost news gathering organization in the world, distinguished by the depth of reporting, global infrastructure and quality journalism that is unrivaled and unmatched. Congratulations to you all!

I want to especially thank Amy, Ken and Michael for their leadership, professionalism and focus. This is not an easy time in our world, and I know it is not an easy time at CNN. Thanks to the entire CNN Global organization for all that you do and for continuously working so hard. You are putting yourselves in harm’s way doing a job that is more important, valued and necessary than ever before. Thank you again.

The legacy of Ted and CNN is long, proud and historic. The stewardship of this incredible organization is an amazing opportunity. I am confident you will love Chris, and that he is the next great leader to move CNN forward to even higher heights all around the world, and on every platform. I could not be more excited about the future and look forward to seeing you soon.

Best, David

PREVIOUSLY: Discovery made the official announcement on Monday that Chris Licht, currently executive producer of The Late Show with Stephen Colbert, will lead CNN after the completion of the Discovery-WarnerMedia merger.

Licht will start as chairman and CEO of CNN in early May. He will report to David Zaslav, who will lead the merged Warner Bros.-Discovery, with a deal expected to close by early in the spring.

Zaslav said in a statement, “Chris is a dynamic and creative producer, an engaging and thoughtful journalist, and a true news person. He has more than two decades of broadcast experience across local, cable and national news. He has been in the field, in the control room and on the set. He is a highly principled individual who is trusted, hard-working and makes every organization stronger, more innovative, and more cohesive.”

Licht said in a statement, “I’m honored to have this opportunity, especially at such an important time for our country and the world. CNN has a rich and storied legacy and I both promise to uphold it and build upon it. I am eternally grateful to Stephen Colbert and the peerless Late Show team for an unforgettable run. I am looking forward to returning to my journalism roots.”

Word leaked out over the weekend that Zaslav had selected Licht to lead CNN, succeeding Jeff Zucker, who abruptly resigned earlier this month, citing his failure to promptly disclose a relationship with a top executive at the network. That executive, Allison Gollust, who led CNN’s marketing efforts, also resigned.

No successor to Licht has been announced at Late Show, where he helped vault Colbert’s late-night program to the top of the ratings, with more direct humor that became a nightly comedy commentary on the presidency of Donald Trump. The show continues to lead in the ratings even after Trump left office, and on Tuesday will continue another of Licht’s innovations: live broadcasts, with a show scheduled after President Joe Biden’s State of the Union address. Licht also served as vice president of special programming at CBS.

Licht was the co-creator and original executive producer of MSNBC’s Morning Joe, which launched in 2007. Its format of free-flowing yet newsy conversation, featuring politicians and pundits, proved to be influential in media and political circles in Manhattan and D.C., as well as a contrast to the broadcast morning shows. Licht left the show in 2012 to relaunch CBS’ morning show as CBS This Morning, giving it a newsier touch and with Gayle King, Norah O’Donnell and Charlie Rose as co-anchors.

CNN, though, will be a much bigger challenge than any of his previous jobs, as he will be leading a network with thousands of employees and dozens of bureaus around the world. There also has been criticism to Zucker’s tenure, that it veered too far to opinion and commentary, particularly in pushing back against Trump, in a way that tarnished the more sober CNN brand. Among those critics have been John Malone, the chairman of Liberty Media, who will be among the largest shareholders of the newly combined company.

That said, Zaslav’s choice of Licht may be a signal that Warner Bros.-Discovery wants to retain CNN as a subsidiary in the longterm, rather than spin it off or sell it. The CNN networks are a major source of cash, generating $714.7 million in profit in 2020, according to an analysis from Kagan and reported by the Pew Research Center.

Licht also will oversee CNN+, the subscription streaming service that is set to launch in the spring, and a key question is whether the strategy for the new venture will shift. Zucker was aggressively courting high-profile and highly-paid talent for the service, landing such figures as Chris Wallace from Fox News and Kasie Hunt from NBC News and MSNBC.

Zucker’s exit from CNN rattled many of its employees, with a number of on-air personalities expressing their anxieties and dismay to WarnerMedia CEO Jason Kilar over how the situation was handled. Zucker, who led CNN for nine years, had been expected to at least serve in some advisory capacity after the merger, something that gave solace to network figures who saw him as key to pushing back against attacks from Trump and others on the right.

Yet CNN’s ratings had fallen considerably since the 2020 election and its aftermath. Some of that is to be expected, given the momentous nature of the presidential election that year, but CNN has a major hole to fill in its primetime schedule following Zucker’s decision to fire Chris Cuomo in December. That exit triggered Zucker’s own departure, as he disclosed his relationship with Gollust in the midst of a third-party investigation of Cuomo and the assistance he gave to his brother, then-New York Gov. Andrew Cuomo, as he faced multiple claims of sexual harassment.

According to Kilar, the third-party investigation “found violations of Company policies, including CNN’s News Standards and Practices, by Jeff Zucker, Allison Gollust, and Chris Cuomo.” Gollust, in her resignation, blasted the circumstances of her exit, contending that it was “an attempt to retaliate against me and change the media narrative” over how Kilar handled the situation.

Amy Entelis, Ken Jautz and Michael Bass, who has served as interim heads of CNN following Zucker’s exit, sent a memo to staffers below:

This morning’s announcement of Chris Licht as the future leader of CNN marks a new chapter for our company. We want to congratulate Chris on his appointment, and reaffirm our commitment to supporting all of you through this time of transition.

Our mission through the rest of the interim period is to ensure we are all able to continue performing at the highest levels of journalism, to pursue fact over fiction, and to inform the world. And above all else, to provide the necessary support to protect our people, who are fulfilling CNN’s mission, every single day.

David Zaslav and Chris Licht want to share some thoughts about the upcoming transition, which we are attaching here.

We are proud of your extraordinary work, and honored to be serving as the interim leadership of CNN during this challenging but inspiring time.

As always, we are here if you need us. And ever thankful for all you do.

Best,

Amy, Michael & Ken

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