About me
I am a former TV news exec turned academic, author and commentator.
Since June 2005, I’ve been Professor of Journalism at - and head of - Britain’s leading journalism school at City University London.
TV journalism
My broadcast news career started with a summer internship at CBS News in 1987, and I went on the payroll the year after. I spent four of the most exciting years in international news with CBS: the ending of the Lebanese hostage crisis and the Iran-Iraq War; the collapse of the Soviet Union and the fall of the Berlin Wall; and the first Gulf War.
In 1993, I joined ITN’s News At Ten which took me from Belfast to Bosnia, and to many other places besides. Three years later, I joined the launch team for Five News.
Five went on air in 1997, with the British general election that brought Tony Blair to power. It reported the death of Diana, Princess of Wales, and took in every story from Kosovo to 9/11 and subsequent wars in Afghanistan and Iraq. Its reporters and their cameras travelled light, but they reported with distinction from every continent.
I also turned analogue newsrooms digital, pioneered low-cost news production, and did an MBA at London Business School.
At Five, I was lucky enough to spend a few years sitting alongside one of the world’s finest broadcasters, Kirsty Young, and a bunch of very creative, youthful (they were then) and talented people which - as all journalists know - “beats working for a living.”
Along the way, things I did at Five, at Dunblane, and in Bosnia picked up Royal Television Society awards. A report on aid to Rwanda won gold at the New York Festivals and overall Festival prize.
Before joining City University London, I had a brief but very enjoyable time at Sky News. The British general election in May 2005 - Tony Blair’s last - happened to be my farewell to TV news.
Writing and commentary
My most recent book - written with my mate, Mike Hanley - is Can You Trust The Media? (Icon, 2008). It has stirred up some controversy. BBC Radio 5 Live called it “fantastic.” Andrew Gilligan called it “nihilistic.” The Observer said it was “startlingly cynical.”
The Guardian called it “amusingly blunt” and its prescriptions “excellent”, and - in the same paper - columnist Peter Preston said Gordon Brown “ought to sit up and take notice.”
Mike and I also co-authored Crunch Time: How Everyday Life Is Killing The Future (Icon, 2007) which the Sydney Morning Herald (Mike’s an Aussie) called “warm, witty and inspiring.”
I blog about the media here at adrianmonck.com. I’ve written for the Guardian, New Statesman, Evening Standard, Scotsman and Press Gazette, and been quoted everywhere from the New York Times to Asharq al-Awsat.
Consultancy
I have undertaken consultancy on communications in the UK, Europe, the Middle East and Africa. I’ve worked with CEOs at FTSE top 20 companies, with government ministers and civil servants, and leading international news organizations.
I’ve addressed audiences at Oxford, Cambridge, SOAS and the UK Defence Academy. In 2005-6, I was President of the Media Society, presenting David Dimbleby with the society’s annual award.
In 2008, the World Economic Forum invited me to join their Global Agenda Council on Media.
Visiting scholar at Madrid’s Instituto de Empresa and external assessor at the University of Hong Kong j-school.
I don’t make editorial calls any more, but I have chaired awards juries and judged - amongst others, the British Press Awards, the International Emmies, the BAFTAs, the RTS, Broadcast and What The Papers Say.
I’m a member of BAFTA, the RTS, the Media Society and the Royal Society of Arts.
My first degree was in Modern History (2:1, if you must know) from Exeter College, Oxford. I edited the university’s newspaper, Cherwell, and was JCR President.
