Radio boss takes over at critical time for television

Sussan Turner

Sussan Turner loves the view of the Auckland skyline from wide open bi-fold windows at MediaWorks' radio offices in trendy Ponsonby Rd.

Now the MediaWorks radio boss has been elevated to group managing director of the entire media group - including TV3, C4 and the online arm.

For the past three months Turner has been spending more time in the bowels of the studios in Newton learning about television business.

She will be assisted on the mechanics of television programmes by her husband Michael Turner - a former TV3 journalist and sports producer.

In particular, she will be examining detailed business plans for TV3 and C4.

She is taking over the television arm at a critical time for all media, when radio has been relatively resilient and free-to-air television vulnerable.

MediaWorks owners, the Australian private equity company Ironbridge Capital, will be hoping the downturn in advertising has reached rock bottom.

Turner was a protege of longtime MediaWorks chief executive Brent Impey.

Neither he nor Turner would be interviewed for this article.

Impey has a gagging clause in his restraint-of-trade exit package, and Turner said it was too early for her to comment publicly about the business.

While Impey spent much of his time in the radio arm, there had been a good working relationship between the two broadcast executives.

But after he took a role overseeing the television arm in September 2008, relations between radio and television had sometimes been strained.

In one case tempers flared when Michael Laws attacked the TV3-backed Telethon.

News and current affairs boss Mark Jennings had a tense relationship over radio's use of television news presenters.

Industry sources said Impey had been under intense pressure to improve returns from television.

Ironbridge had bought MediaWorks with heavily leveraged debt, which threatened to cripple it when television revenue was down.

Impey fought to retain key programmes and had worked hard for the retention of Campbell Live and Sunrise.

With Ironbridge negotiating a capital restructuring that eased pressure on MediaWorks, Impey stepped down. It is understood he received a seven- figure exit package.

But despite expectations, Turner was not appointed in his place. The MediaWorks board - chaired by Brent Harman - decided instead to create a new, unorthodox structure in which Television boss Ian Audsley would report directly to the board.

Three months later, Harman and the Mediaworks board changed its mind. They made Turner group MD, replaced Audsley with Jason Paris, and Belinda Mulgrew is expected to take over radio.

"We genuinely thought the first structure would work," said Harman. "In the time since Brent Impey finished in November, the board had the opportunity to watch her more closely in action and we were very impressed."

Television insiders said the majority owners at Ironbridge had wanted the company to resume growth and were wary of results for television.

Harman said Audsley, the broadcasting consultant placed in temporary charge of the television operation, was still completing his review of TV3 and C4.

But he insisted that there were no plans for wholesale cuts or changes to television operations.

As well as TV3 and C4, MediaWorks owns 10 national radio brands.