In New York’s Hudson River Valley. Image – Getty iStockphoto: Brandt Bolding
By Porter Anderson, Editor-in-Chief | @Porter_Anderson
See also: In Germany, Christian Jünger named CEO of PRH Verlagsgruppe
A Three-Day Symposium for PRH International Leadership
In the first such gathering of its kind, 30 of Penguin Random House‘s international imprint and division leaders are gathering in Hudson Valley, New York.
The event, which the company emphasizes is highlighting the extensive international reach of the world’s largest publishing company, is being presented to Publishing Perspectives as the latest in a series of more than 20 such forums.
Each has been built around one or more themes including editorial, technology and data, supply chain issues, sustainability, marketing, and audio.
Opening on Tuesday (July 16), the international forum is set for three days.
Publishing Perspectives understands that the program is to include an “agent event,” as well as internal initiatives.
A top priority, we’re told, is strategies for supporting authors, including—per information provided to us—”best practices for navigating an increasingly complex media landscape, engaging with [those authors’] audiences, and consumer insights.”
In another element of the programming, an author-specific element, the bestselling writer Steven Johnson is expected to discuss his experiences in using artificial intelligence in contributing to the development of Google’s NotebookLM app. Reportedly available in at least 200 countries, the NotebookLM AI assistive app (built on the Gemini 1.5 Pro model) is among a number of tools that can be used to produce summaries and lists of key topics. The development of such features relative to the creation of study guides, emails, and presumably, more advanced long-form documents, clearly can be of use to authors and others engaged in textual creativity.
Additional topics the forum is to examine, we’re told, include:
- Identifying growth opportunities
- Developing entrepreneurial editorial talent
- Enabling innovation
Malaviya: ‘Our Commitment to Diversity in Publishing’
Penguin Random House worldwide CEO Nihar Malaviya speaks in the opening Executive Talk in the Publishing Perspectives Forum on October 18, 2023, at Frankfurter Buchmesse, watched (foreground) by Nana Lohrengel, secretary general of the Fondazione Umberto e Elisabetta Mauri. Image: FBM, Marc Jacquemin
Penguin Random House worldwide CEO Nihar Malaviya—speaking a day after his announcement that Christian Jünger will succeed Thomas Rathnow as CEO of Penguin Random House Verlagsgruppe—clearly stresses the centricity of diversity issues in the run-up to this inaugural forum.
“At Penguin Random House,” Malaviya says today (July 11), “our imprints and publishers are at the heart of what we do.
“The Global Publishing Forum reinforces our strategic focus on creativity, and our commitment to diversity in publishing—amplifying a diversity of voices in a diversity of places for a diversity of readers around the world—continues to drive our success and growth strategy.”
And to our inquiries, the company says that PRH figures invited to this inaugural forum will come from the States, the United Kingdom, Germany, India, and Canada, as well from components of Grupo Editorial, Companhia Das Letras in São Paulo, and DK. The levels of players on the list of attendees include president, executive vice-president, editorial director, and managing director.
Reflecting that geographical range, the company’s commentary to us points out that PRH “was formed as the world’s first truly international publisher in 2013.”
Malaviya’s drive for further internationalism is evidenced in operations and in publishing process, with an annual investment, spokespeople say, of US$1 billion in content at international scale and, in the last decade, as much as $200 million invested in its world supply chain.
Penguin Random House Awards
In addition to next week’s first Global Publishing Forum, PRH has also instituted a new Penguin Random House Awards program to recognize outstanding work of its internal teams on the international level. There are more than 140 employee teams making submissions (now closed) from 15 nations and relative to “every facet of the business, we’re told.”
Malaviya is to announce winners of the inaugural cycle of these new awards in October, and the key emphasis in this new awards regime is cultural and commercial impact. Such a program of in-company recognition actually can help develop a shared internal culture as teams in various parts of the world learn about and applaud each other’s sometimes far-flung work.
Categories for the PRH awards are:
- Content, in which efforts to invest in authors and their success are honored
- Reach, for work in marketing, publicity, sales, and supply chain, in which the point is reaching “the widest possible audience”
- Enablement, which may encompass systems, tools, and organizational environments that empower performance
Awards are to be evaluated based on a combination of impact and skills, behaviors, and mindsets that the company’s leadership wants to promote and foster in the company. They include tangible business results around revenue contribution; accolades; strategic audience growth; international reach; and cost savings; as well as a demonstration of behaviors including curiosity, risk-taking, market-orientation, initiative, innovative thinking, persistence, and adaptability.
More from Publishing Perspectives on the work of Penguin Random House is here, more on international publishing is here, more on publishing and book awards is here, and more on publishing conference events is here.