BBC Global News director: 'Empowerment by social media, that for me is the exciting part of it'

"We're going to do this x32." Not an obvious catchphrase, but an expression that has a very specific and important meaning for the BBC's global operations, director of Global News Peter Horrocks tells Journalism.co.uk.

The phrase is applied when creating new infographics or mobile applications: much of BBC Global's content and the technology behind it needs to be usable by its 32 language services.

In March, the World Service created an infographic as part of its SuperPower season looking at the impact of the internet on people's lives and its future. "We know that those types of graphics work in any language and we can create them simply to allow them to be translated. You create assets that can be multiplied. How many news organisations in the world can you have an English-language app and other versions or stories in 32 languages with the same route through? Technological developments are another way of signalling to the team that we need holistic, global approach," he explains.

It was a couple of months ago that Journalism.co.uk sat down with Horrocks to discuss the future of BBC Global News in a cafe at Broadcasting House, but his excitement at the new, under-construction additions to the building – bringing the World Service and domestic radio news services together for the first time – was evident. In March Horrocks, who became director of Global News in April last year, announced some significant changes for the operation: nine senior management posts were to close and four new roles would be created, saving of £600,000. Since our interview these changes have begun, with three appointments to the new posts of controller of languages, controller of English and controller of digital and technology.

The aim behind the management restructure is to bring about a more global operation, both editorially and organisationally: "I'm a very strong believer that you create change in journalistic organisations by doing it through editorial content," says Horrocks, one more citing the SuperPower season as evidence of this.

"The impact of the internet has to be understood in global terms and through the very different but linked experiences that audiences have around the world. There are places where the internet is entirely new and people are discovering information for the first time; there are other places where it's much more established but it's still having this multiple disruptive effect. The BBC is in a uniquely strong position to be able to look at that from a global perspective because it's got such a wide global footprint and its got the people working within it from the 32 language teams alongside BBC News operation doing the English-language content and that gives you a strength that no other news organisation has got."

Horrocks has form in getting newsrooms to shift their editorial and organisational thinking: in his previous role as head of the BBC's multimedia newsroom he oversaw the move from TV-thinking to multimedia news. Getting journalists working across BBC Global News to think about their own language service and how this works within a global picture is the equivalent task, he says.

Big, international events will help this and the World Cup is a perfect example. BBC Sport is interested in working with BBC Global, whose journalists will offer a different, specialist insight into the teams competing, says Horrocks.

The internet as a prism
Organisational change is easier when people see it through "the prism of the internet", suggests Horrocks: "Because the web is so interfused you move from one page to another, from BBC to partner sites to external sites. Once journalists understand that the audience is consuming content in a much more fluid way and there are no barriers on the internet I think it helps them to think about the need to lower those barriers both within their organisations and externally. It doesn't remove them, but it helps them."

Partnerships are particularly important to BBC Global, which has thousands of broadcast partners across the world, and Horrocks has been in talks with other international public service broadcasters about how they can work together on content and technology. At a time of restricted resources it is important to think more fluidly and the web is an epitome of that, he says.

"The World Service has been fantastically strong and it has been a great fortress and defender of journalistic freedom and there's value in that strength of the institution. I'm committed to retaining that strength, but I think you can also reach out beyond your organisation and within your organisation to be more effective - the internet is the single strongest thing that forces us to do that," says Horrocks.

"The World Service can't be insulated from the world and say this is what we're interested in and this is what we're going to tell you. We do have our values, which are absolutely bedrock and are non-negotiable, but the way you tell stories, the angles that you use, the perspectives that you bring to a world that's changing very fast has to be more responsive to the audience than would have been the case 20 or 30 years ago."

In an interview with the Guardian in February, Horrocks shared his views on social media use by journalists - this was edited and retweeted to suggest he was laying down an ultimatum to journalists on using social media, he explains: "People need to use a range of sources and see RSS and Twitter as sources that they are comfortable using. But I wasn't saying that every BBC journalist as part of their output or broadcast function should have a Twitter account, I think they would create far to much noise and they need to be more focused on their output."

Global perspective, but domestic demands
Social media and the web may not be the priority amongst all of the 32 language services though, which range from Spanish-language service BBC Mundo to services in Urdu, Tamil and Vietnamese. While encouraging a global perspective among staff it's important to remember the different media needs of the individual audiences, says Horrocks.

A recent experiment in Nigeria by the BBC's Hausa service, for example, gave mobile phones to villages in the north of the country and asked them to text the BBC with things that were of interest to them. This led to a story for the BBC Global team there on the issue of land expropriation: "The villagers heard the story that they'd reported coming back - it had a traditional media outcome, but it was a UGC, social media, whatever you want to call it, source.

"We're quite blasé about this because we've had phone ins etc. for many years, but I can tell you in that part of Nigeria the idea that anyone would take notice of a complaint that you make, that kind of empowerment by social media in many of the markets that we are in is entirely new. That for me is the exciting part of it."

Five new mobile services were introduced in Africa last year and the BBC Global journalists working there are told to focus on writing primarily for mobile as its the dominant form of news consumption there. In Somalia shortwave radio is "a lifeline", while the BBC's Brazilian service is "going hell for leather online". Where broadband penetration is picking up, video distribution, without having the full expense of TV services, is a huge opportunity, he says. In other markets, Horrocks would love to launch new TV services, building in particular on the success of BBC Persian and BBC Arabic.

"You can't have a one-size-fits-all approach and say 'these are the stories and the technologies that we're going to use the world over'. The beauty of it is to take a global approach and then to develop it in an appropriate way editorially or technologically for the particular markets. We do have to have strong local content and we have to make the global stories relevant and do it in an appropriate way for the market," he says.

Global reputation
While domestically the BBC has its fair share of critics, notably from some local media organisations who see it as expansionist and its funding as anti-competitive, Horrocks' switch from multimedia newsroom head to global news director has brought a refreshing change in how the BBC is perceived and received.

"For the audience around the world the issues of the BBC's market impact isn't really a concern - the places that we do have market dominance is almost universally welcomed. There aren't editorials saying why is the BBC so big, it's usually appreciating it. It may not be welcomed by some of the governments in those places... but that's a different thing entirely," he says.

"State suppliers have got a lot of resources - but we know from the audience research we have done that their reputation is too much as a representative of their country's point of view and that's absolutely not what we do. The reputation issue is very much in our favour."

Peter Horrocks will be speaking a Polis event tomorrow (11 June) entitled 'The Value of Journalism'.

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