Кризис трансформации: почему медиаиндустрия не может адаптироваться к новым реалиям

Editor’s Note: This is the debut “Slouching Toward Transformation” column from veteran media technologist Marcy Lefkovitz. It will take an unsentimental look at how media organizations and their technology vendors try — and often fail — to transform in a world of complex legacy systems, shrinking margins and uncertain business models. Lefkovitz will offer an empathetic look at how “transformation” often stresses the customer-vendor partnership and focuses on practical ways both sides can evolve to achieve successful, mutually healthy outcomes. I have spent much of my career helping organizations pursue transformation; lately, I wonder whether the word has become part of the problem. I’m considered a “transformational leader,” the “T word” has been in most of my project and job descriptions over the last decade, and my own LinkedIn profile boasts that I accomplish “transformation at scale.” But after a long and proud career inside the news, media and entertainment technology and operations space and more recent stints on the vendor side, I’m questioning whether words like “agility” and “transformation,” which are working overtime these days, are still serving us. Agile transformation is everyone’s goal, yet it’s a struggle to effectively harness new tools and achieve the ambitious operational efficiencies and business outcomes that customers and vendors need. Media organizations and their vendors are stuck in a structural contradiction: They claim to want agility, but they cling to processes, incentives and risk models that point towards slow, brittle outcomes. Why is change so fraught with frustration, which threatens the vendor-customer relationship? Why is it so slow and expensive, often falling short of anticipated measurable results? We have high-quality ingredients for success: companies with tech, operations and finance teams increasingly aligned and willing to change; brilliant minds within software partners eager to provide solutions; experienced helpers in the consulting and systems integration space. Something is wrong with the recipe, if there is a recipe at all. We’ve all been there. We announce an agile transformation project. Perhaps we’re modernizing our newsroom computer system or unifying and modernizing our MAM or media supply chain. Existing systems are old, complex, fragmented. Accompanying workflows are inefficient but deeply embedded in the culture. This project will fix all of that and result in smaller teams able to produce more and faster. So, how does it start? Usually with a 100‑page RFP, months of vendor Q&A, then periods of POCs and demos, all run by small teams concurrently doing their existing day jobs on the old systems and workflows. Because the RIFs predate the transformation. And vendors respond, largely the way they did in 2015. No one is being irrational. Everyone is trying to mitigate risk in a world of radically changing — and increasingly uncertain — business models, with old familiar tools and control mechanisms like large RFPs, exhaustive requirements matrices, procurement‑driven scoring systems and POCs designed to eliminate risk on paper. The fact is that control is an illusion, and those same mechanisms stretch decision cycles to quarters or years, and during that time the underlying economics, audience behaviors, organizational priorities and underlying technology have already changed. The longer the decision takes, the more likely it is that the original business case is obsolete by the time a contract is signed. In addition, vendors want to move to modern, standard SaaS: shared codebases, regular releases, cleaner support models and simpler pricing models with predictable base annual revenue and additional usage-based pricing that grows without friction. But their actual revenue still sometimes depends on legacy patterns: big up‑front deals, custom integrations into highly idiosyncratic environments or professional services that quietly subsidize product gaps or customers’ bespoke requirements. Customers say they want agility but still expect systems to mold perfectly to unique systems and workflows. The result: Vendors are pulled in two directions — market messaging pushes “standard SaaS,” while deal reality forces individualized commitments that erode margins and slow innovation. There is a further truth both sides sometimes avoid: Customers have a direct interest in the fiscal health of the vendors on whose platforms they depend. A vendor unable to invest in its product, security, support, people and roadmap eventually becomes a customer risk, regardless of how attractive the original deal appeared. The converse is also true. Vendors need customers with viable businesses, clear priorities and the capacity to adopt and operate what they buy. These relationships are not simply transactions; they are mutual investments in each other’s future. When pricing, customization, scope or delivery expectations threaten that balance, the responsible move is not to pretend otherwise. It is to identify the problem early and discuss how to course-correct. And let’s not forget the integration layer. Since major tech projects are often overseen by downsized internal teams juggling day‑to‑day operations and project tasks, it’s difficult to dedicate sustained attention to design, testing and change management. That’s where industry consulting firms and third-party professional services teams step in to fill the gap. They often do excellent work, yet their presence can distance the core customer/vendor relationship, creating a “telephone game” regarding requirements, expectations and accountabilities. These service providers are also in a difficult spot. They are incentivized to achieve perfect outcomes in a complex and imperfect world. And when success is declared, they are no longer needed. Here lies the core contradiction. Everyone wants transformation, but they’re operating with tools, contracts and habits built for a different era. For change to be agile, the industry needs to take an evolutionary approach — smaller steps, clearer shared expectations and an admission that uncertainty is the norm. Big Bang transformation disappoints and sours relationships. Strategic evolution among honest, transparent partners is the healthy path. This column’s job will be to dig into the economics of SaaS in media, the bespoke trap, the role of consultants and integrators and what concrete practices can make vendor–customer relationships more resilient.