The flagship of the US media group Politico is the brand of the same name, which mainly reports on political issues. The company was founded in the USA in 2007, relied on online offers early on and has thus developed into one of the most important media in Washington’s political life. Today the company has around 700 employees in North America.
Politico has also published a European edition since 2015. There the manager becomes the chairwoman of the shareholders’ council. The group also includes the Protocol page, which specializes in technology topics.
Sheikholeslami is expected to “make Politico the global market leader when it comes to news and information on politics and regulation in the world’s most important centers of power”, as Jan Bayer, CEO News Media at Axel Springer, puts it.
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Axel Springer wants to grow in the US market. With the “Business Insider” news portal and the “Morning Brew” newsletter, Springer already has two US subsidiaries. Since the entry of the major American investor KKR in 2019, Springer has increasingly relied on digital business models.
Lots of experience in the media sector
The appointment of Sheikholeslami is now the first major move in the Politico group. The manager seems to be prepared for the new task, she has a lot of experience in the media sector. Sheikholeslami is still the head of New York Public Radio, an association with several brands that is financed through memberships and donations. Prior to that, she directed Chicago Public Media.
Her career began in the private media sector. Between 2002 and 2010, Sheikholeslami pushed ahead with the integration of print and online at the traditional newspaper Washington Post and turned the newspaper into a digital medium. She also worked for the Time Warner and Condé Nast media groups.
What impresses Sheikholeslami about her new role at Politico is “above all the persistence and consistency that characterize the successful business model and the courageous, fact-based journalism”. No other media company has such a strong foundation for further growth.
In fact, Sheikholeslami not only has to ensure that her new employer is growing, but first and foremost about calm. The Springer takeover led to tensions among US employees when publishing director Mathias Döpfner announced that he would introduce a payment barrier on the site, but later rowed back again. In addition, some top authors have left Politico.
Sheikholeslami is familiar with personal upheavals. In her most recent position at New York Public Radio, she headed an editorial department in which there were many personal difficulties and disputes about the correct representation of minorities even before she took office. Then there was the pandemic, which hit the metropolis first and particularly dramatically.
Number of listeners doubled
Still, Sheikholeslami managed to improve finances without laying off staff. She was able to double the number of listeners during her tenure, also because she had strengthened the local focus of the programs, which enabled the listeners to identify better with the station. At Politico, Sheikholeslami is now succeeding investment banker Patrick Steel, who headed the media company between 2017 and 2021. Before that, founder Robert Allbritton was CEO.
When asked why she chose the media industry, she answered last year in an interview with her own past as an immigrant: “My life experience has shown me the privilege of what it means to live in a democracy.”
Sheikholeslami is the daughter of an Iranian diplomat, fled with her family shortly after the Iranian Revolution of 1979 and came to the USA as a political refugee. She grew up in the Washington DC suburbs and studied international economics, later earning an MBA.
The manager once said: “Well-informed and committed citizens are still the basis of our democracy.” In order to strengthen this basis, Sheikholeslami must now prove her skills at Politico.
More: Stricter rules for relationships in the office – Springer’s plan is unusual in Germany