Crains New York - April 8, 2013 - (Page 4)

IN THE The decline of newspapers MARKETS has been a boon for j-schools Tech skills give students an edge in cutthroat market BY MATTHEW FLAMM Between 2003 and 2012, media giant Gannett Co. shed more than 20,000 employees, some of them journalists at its television stations, local newspapers and flagship daily USA Today. Still, the publisher recently sent recruiters to the Columbia University Graduate School of Journalism annual jobs fair—which drew a record 135 companies. “Clearly, we want people who have multimedia skills and understand the transition from print to digital,” said Virgil Smith, Gannett’s vice president of talent acquisition and diversity. Mr. Smith emphasized that Gannett recruits from a range of venues, not just fancy journalism schools.But the presence of all those companies in Morningside Heights suggests that graduate journalism programs may be more helpful to a career than ever before. As technology continues to tear apart the news industry and the once smooth career path of the newspaperman, digital skills gained from reputable schools may be the edge journalists need to compete in a shrinking job market. Not that j-schools aren’t still being derided as useless. Media critic Michael Wolff recently wrote that Columbia ought to “just shut its doors,” rather than send its students “into a world of ever-bleaker prospects.” He also mocked the school for picking two-time Pulitzer Prize winner Steve Coll as the new dean, because he doesn’t tweet. Last week, New York Times media columnist David Carr defended Mr. Coll—but called most programs “escalators to nowhere.” Columbia—like its Manhattan peers,New York University’s Arthur L. Carter Journalism Institute and the CUNY Graduate School of Journalism—has gone to great lengths to prove its worth in the marketplace, adding subjects like data visualization and digital news design. And the marketplace has been returning the favor. “Our employment numbers are actually up considerably,” said Nicholas Lemann, dean of the journalism school for a decade who will be stepping down in July. “That’s in part because of happy things, like our graduates are very talented and skilled, and in part unhappy things, like a 27-year-old coming out of this school is more desirable in the labor force than a 55-year-old who doesn’t have any digital skills.” Statistics for how many journalism graduates find jobs are not uniformly available among the city’s See JOURNALISM on Page 24 We congratulate our client along with and on closing their $35M financing of a 12.3 megawatt solar installation for a public-private partnership (PPP) at Joint Military Base McGuire-Dix-Lakehurst in Burlington County, New Jersey NEW YORK COMMUNITY BANCORP CEO Joseph Ficalora, 65. How bank sales, CEO ages relate L ast week, Sterling Bancorp agreed to be acquired by Provident New York Bancorp for $344 million. The happy couple declared that the corporate marriage was struck to “create a combined financial services firm specializing in serving small- to middle-market commercial and consumer clients in the Greater New York metropolitan area.” They promised a blissful postmerger existence in which the combined company’s operating costs would be 18% lower than if the banks had remained apart. And so on and so on. (See story on Page 13, “Putting your accounts in hock,” for more on Sterling’s business.) But here’s one major reason why Sterling decided to sell: Chief Executive Louis Cappelli is only two years younger than the bank, which was founded in 1929. It turns out that a bank CEO’s age is a useful indicator for figuring out when the institution will be sold. According to analysts at Keefe Bruyette & Woods, CEOs who have sold their banks recently are on average 64 years old, compared with 58 for the average CEO of a small or midsize bank. It doesn’t hurt if the CEO has a large slug of stock that he can cash out in a merger, the KBW analysts said, although in the case of Mr. Cappelli this doesn’t appear to have been a significant factor. Over his lengthy career at Sterling, beginning in 1949, Mr. Cappelli amassed 773,000 shares for a stake that’s worth $8.5 million. His pension benefit, however, is valued at $23 million, according to the company’s most recent annual proxy statement. So who’s next? One possibility, according to KBW, is New York Com- 5 Want more info on our done deals? Scan the QR Code with your smart phone. 4 | Crain’s New York Business | April 8, 2013 bloomberg news by Aaron Elstein munity Bancorp, a Long Islandbased bank that’s been expanding for years via acquisitions. According to reports, it is again on the hunt to buy. Still, CEO Joseph Ficalora is 65, and his stake in the bank, where he’s worked since 1965, is worth about $70 million. Another could be BankUnited, the Florida-based thrift run by former North Fork chief John Kanas that has just started opening branches in New York. Mr. Kanas has made it clear he’s keen on expanding, but he’s also 66, and KBW analysts said in a report last week that the SterlingProvident merger means two of the bank’s “most likely” targets are slipping away. As a consolation prize, Mr. Kanas might try to acquire Astoria Financial Corp. for less than its market price of $900 million, the KBW analysts speculated. Astoria CEO Monte Redman is 62, and his shares in the bank are worth $9 million, according to Bloomberg. He took the top job only two years ago, but if he can’t turn around the struggling bank soon, his hand could be forced. Ⅲ THE NUMBER OF ROUNDS of venture capital raised by Business Insider, the website run by former Wall Street analyst Henry Blodget (left). The company said last week that Amazon CEO Jeff Bezos had invested in its latest $5 million cash injection. When he was a Wall Street analyst during the dot-com boom, Mr. Blodget won his reputation by singing early praises of Amazon’s stock. http://goulstonstorrs.com

Table of Contents for the Digital Edition of Crains New York - April 8, 2013

IN THE BOROUGHS
IN THE MARKETS
THE INSIDER
BUSINESS PEOPLE
SMALL BUSINESS
OPINION
GREG DAVID
REPORT: BANKING
THE LISTS
FOR THE RECORD
CLASSIFIEDS
REAL ESTATE DEALS
NEW YORK, NEW YORK
SOURCE LUNCH
OUT AND ABOUT
SNAPS

Crains New York - April 8, 2013