CNN reviews

High stress and very demanding. Editorial staff puts in a lot of hours outside of work via email. Management seems to like to hire from outside instead of promoting from within. There are some internal promotions, but most come from outside CNN or from other departments within CNN. Career management is up to the employee. Not much mentoring and few managers will be looking out for your future. There are some supervisors/managers who try to help, but most just take care of themselves.

CNN, like almost all news media organizations, is in a long-term struggle for survival to keep subscribers and advertisers as the Internet pulls more and more eyes away from traditional news outlets. This translates into radical changes as management tries new ways to increase viewership, resulting in periodic seismic shifts in staffing... so stay for the exciting work, but make sure you keep your resume polished and have a back-door exit plan. It used to be the case that talented employees could count on their job being permanent (barring acts of misconduct); but that is no longer the case. Expect periodic downsizings and elimination of special departments (i.e. CNN's science and technology unit). As one of my former managers helpfully suggested as my unit was being reformed and I was left without a job, "embrace change".