Steve Buttry is helping to lead the radical transformation of Gazette Communication in Cedar Rapids, Iowa.

Yesterday we had an in-depth post about those changes and why Buttry believes they are necessary. In addition, we ask Buttry some of the whys below:

Alana: The Cedar Rapids Gazette is undergoing a radical reorganization that no newspaper company has ever done before. What are you most worried about?

Buttry: One of them is revenue. I am very confident that we are innovating wisely and aggressively on the content side, but I am not as closely tied to the side that works with revenue. I trust that the team that works on revenue is reorganizing and moving and hiring to innovate as aggressively as the content team, but I, personally, can’t see the immediate progress yet.

The other thing related to that is that we could do everything right with revenue in terms of changing how we work, think, and going beyond, and yet we are in a terrible economy. In other words, we may have the answer but right now may just be the wrong time. Not to mention, Cedar Rapids and other smaller communities were burdened by a recent flooding disaster that created huge economic impacts. These types of events have huge impacts and are completely out of our control.

My second worry is that workplace cultures are tremendously difficult to change. I think we are making significant progress in changing it, but work habits and way of thinking of the newsroom will need to change dramatically to make our new approach work. While I see that they are changing, I worry that they wont change as quickly or as dramatically enough.

Alana: How did the idea for this whole reorganization come about? Was there an existing model that inspired you? Whose idea was it?

Buttry: It was a marriage of ideas. I came up with the vision. When I was at the American Institute I developed an image of what I thought newsrooms could look like, which became the C3 – Complete Community Connection. Once I met Chuck Peters (CEO of Gazette Communications) I could see he was onto the “how” of my “what.”

Alana: With the new structure in place, will the reporters be beatblogging?

Buttry: Yes, but in a different sense than what exists presently. We are separating our content operation entirely from our product operation. Our reporters will be blogging, but they are going to be multitasking entrepreneurial journalists. (I don’t use the term blogger just because has gotten a more narrow meaning in the public as a “guy with a lot of opinions in his pajamas in his basement saying, ‘Here is what I think about the world.”) They are going to be more than beat reporters. One of the things we’re doing is changing terminology in order to change thinking. So, we tell them: You own this topic, you are responsible for generating content on this topic. Some of that content will be words, video, still pictures, data, etc. Colleagues will be there to help, but essentially it’s all up to you.

Alana: Sounds like The Gazette is on to something revolutionary. By what date should we expect to see some sort of “proof of success,” if you will?

Buttry: By April 6 we will have a lot of our transition completed. I will be disappointed if we don’t have a full operation going by May. I’m sure there’ll be shakedown period where we do stupid things, while we try to figure things out. By next Fall we should have a lots of success stories and a few stories of failure.

Alana: Do you expect other newspaper companies to follow your lead?

Buttry: We’re in a copycat industry, and we’re in one that’s desperate for solutions. So, yes, particularly if we’re successful in the revenue side. We’re already getting a lot of attention across the web and on the news; it would be surprising if no one thought we were on to something good.