Garry Linnell: staying true to the craft

Fairfax’s Garry Linnell has been promoted to editorial director of its metro division after less than a year with the company. He spoke to Encore’s Brooke Hemphill in February about his role, taking risks and why this is the best time to be a journalist

You can always gauge the esteem a journalist is held in by the amount of care their colleagues take when preparing a mock leaving cover. If the production values of the fake front page of The Bulletin positioned on the highest shelf of Garry Linnell’s office are anything to go by, the team at Fairfax are going to enjoy working with their new boss. Emblazoned on the cover is Linnell’s face in full Gene Simmonds Kiss makeup with the cover line ‘I was made for leaving you Gaz.’

Linnell has been in this office for just over three months and his role as national editor of metro media is something of a mystery to many. “It’s a unique sort of role, national editor,” Linnell notes. “It’s taken a lot of people, particularly outside Fairfax, to understand.” While people away from the Darling Island headquarters are still wrapping their heads around his appointment, Linnell has been busily bringing about change at the company where he began his career almost 30 years ago.

Garry Linnell joined The Age newspaper as a cadet, fresh from high school, in 1982. “When I started, I walked into The Age office and there was a desk, a Remington typewriter, a bell shaped telephone and an ashtray. And that was it,” Linnell says. “We went to shorthand classes then to police rounds to learn the craft. They were supposed to be the golden days.”