New York Times publisher Arthur Sulzberger Jr. on Saturday clarified that former executive editor Jill Abramson was not fired over a dispute about compensation.
After Abramson was suddenly fired from the Times last week, reports that she recently confronted management about being paid less than her male predecessors began to circulate.
Sulzberger disputed the claims in a memo to Times staff on Thursday, and expanded on the management issues he felt Abramson faced as executive editor in a Saturday statement.
“Rather than accepting that this was a situation involving a specific individual who, as we all do, has strengths and weaknesses, a shallow and factually incorrect storyline has emerged,” he said in the statement. “Fueling this have been persistent but incorrect reports that Jill’s compensation package was not comparable with her predecessor’s. This is untrue.”
“During her tenure, I heard repeatedly from her newsroom colleagues, women and men, about a series of issues, including arbitrary decision-making, a failure to consult and bring colleagues with her, inadequate communication and the public mistreatment of colleagues,” Sulzberger continued. “I discussed these issues with Jill herself several times and warned her that, unless they were addressed, she risked losing the trust of both masthead and newsroom. She acknowledged that there were issues and agreed to try to overcome them. We all wanted her to succeed. It became clear, however, that the gap was too big to bridge and ultimately I concluded that she had lost the support of her masthead colleagues and could not win it back.
