Pérez Tornero is committed to media convergence and transmedia content on RTVE

The president of RTVE, José Manuel Pérez Tornero, presented this Monday, April 19 in the Senate in his first parliamentary appearance after taking office, his project for the Corporation that will establish as priority tasks a change in the governance system, a new Program Contract, a comprehensive production and programming system and a new business structure.

The main objective is for RTVE “to become, in a very short time, a truly relevant service” and to provide citizens with “good information, guidance in an increasingly complex world, and the lucidity that is needed in moments of special difficulty,” he stated.

In his appearance, which he requested on the same day he took office, he announced senior management appointments In the month of May, he assured that he will defend “committed and quality journalism to its ultimate consequences” and has made a total commitment to rigor.

Furthermore, he has stated that he will try to defend that there are no attacks on journalism professionals. “Criticism, yes, as deserved, but no persecution, no harassment, because no one deserves harassment of what the media calls the digital packs that are launched against someone.”

New technological ecosystem

The president of RTVE has defended the need to offer a new model of interaction with citizens that will imply a complete change of the production system, the empowerment of interactive services and the creation of new channels and platforms and functional redefinition of existing ones.

In this area, he has advocated the implementation of a new technological model that takes advantage of the media convergence and that enhances the production and programming of transmedia content, as well as the creation of a comprehensive production system and more efficient programming, and that takes advantage of the corporation's multichannel power and its convergence.

In this new context, the president of RTVE has advocated for strengthen international presence and channels; a new system of international alliances, especially with European and Latin American public broadcasters; new financing and marketing formulas abroad; increase the volume of investments in production through commercial alliances; enhance the uniqueness of RTVE's offer, seeking new consumption and diffusion niches; expand financial resources through mixed forms of co-production and shared marketing, and establish new audiovisual policy strategies.

A new business structure

Pérez Tornero has finally defended a new business structure that allows simplify bureaucratic processes, improve decision making, reduce areas and departments, enhance continuous learning, ensure the incentive career, achieve a internal pacification and encourage harmony and understanding, as well as make better use of our own production capacity, without excluding external talent. All this to achieve a more efficient company, younger staff with better skills and a more horizontal organizational chart.

All this transformation will only be possible with “realism” and responsibility, first on the part of Parliament, which has in its hands the elaboration of a new Framework Mandate and secondly on the part of the Executive Branch, responsible for the new Contract-Program, and then of all the people who work at RTVE. "I want to affirm that the people who work at RTVE are committed to the transformation, they need a spark of enthusiasm, a little love from all of you, and trust in the country. This will exists," he added.

A new time on RTVE

The president of RTVE has stressed that "we are obliged to reinvent and redefine from top to bottom its public service mission, change its structures and provide them with new capabilities so that they respond to the need for guidance and that we require."

The appointment, by more than two-thirds of the chambers of the new council and presidency of RTVE, has left the path clear in their opinion, and may constitute a turning point. “We can, therefore, begin a new time, with clear objectives and a precise route,” he said. He has exposed the four main axes of this transformation, of this new time in RTVE: a new governance, a new relationship with citizens in a new technological ecosystem, a new context of competitiveness and a profound structural change,

The first axis will be to obtain open governance: The responsibility of the direction and management of RTVE will be open to suggestions and requirements from its social environment. “RTVE will no longer be a kind of closed preserve, or defensive citadel, and will become an authentic public square, which will take advantage of and assume the power and initiative of everyone,” he defended.

To achieve this new governance, he has highlighted the need to promote consensus in decision making. Along these lines, it has proposed integrating the contributions of the members of the Board of Directors into a systematic and coherent project, starting a participatory process with those who participated in the competition to integrate their proposals into the new project, and an open social dialogue to debate all actions.

He has also advocated for a transparency effort, with a battery of tasks that include effective compliance with legal transparency obligations. He has also defended the active pluralism of the new RTVE, both external and internal.

To promote this new governance, it has announced a process of public consultation and social debate on the objectives and principles of RTVE's public service. It will conclude in the writing of a White Paper on RTVE which will collect the conclusions of the debate and will serve as a basis for the preparation of the New framework mandate which must be renewed and which Pérez Tornero describes as “our second constitution.”