Dohle Speaks...In Letter Form

-- Publishers Weekly, 6/3/2008 3:15:00 PM

In his first open letter to Random House staffers, new company CEO Markus Dohle touched on everything from his adjustment to life in New York City to his trip out to BEA. Below is Dohle's letter in full, which was sent to RH employees this morning. 

June 3, 2008 

Dear North American Colleagues, 

I am so honored and happy to join you at Random House that I just couldn’t wait until yesterday, my first official day, to begin my new job. Over the weekend, I flew to Los Angeles to attend the Book Expo America (BEA) convention. It was a terrific experience and an ideal moment for me to pay my respects to and get acquainted with people in our publishing world.

I had dozens of great conversations there with booksellers, our authors, some members of the press, several of our competitors’ CEOs, and of course, with our sales and publishing colleagues. From my first moment, they made me a part of our convention team. They wonderfully supported our efforts at the Random House booth and at our many author and customer events. I asked a lot of questions, listened to a lot of answers, and learned a lot—and had a lot of fun. I expect to be doing much more asking and listening in the months ahead as I get to know the company and the marketplace well.

After fifteen years of printing and distributing books at Bertelsmann, it is a privilege for me to now help to publish them at Random House. My BEA visit reinforced my belief that this is a challenging but also a great time for all of us to be in the trade book business, a business Bertelsmann is really committed to. As a core value of that commitment, I will carry forward our longstanding support for the independence of our publishers worldwide and continue to provide them with the resources they require to acquire the books and authors they need to make their publishing programs successful, enabling them to contribute to Random House’s future.
As for the many challenges we face ahead, we have to adapt to and take advantage of them better than anyone else in book publishing. Finding solutions to these challenges will require a companywide team approach which I am excited to lead and to be a part of.

For me, exciting changes ahead are both professional and personal. I am glad about now living in New York and I am eager to become a real New Yorker. My wife of thirteen years, Karin, who was my high school sweetheart, my son Niklas, who is ten, and my daughter, Julia, seven, will be moving here from Germany later this year, and we are already making great plans for our new lives.

As I begin to advance the traditions of Random House, I thank Peter Olson for his outstanding leadership of our company. It is impressive that he completed his 4000-bestsellers decade last week, with the announcement of our dual #1 New York Times bestsellers on Sunday, June 8: #1 Hardcover Fiction, ODD HOURS by Dean Koontz, and #1 Hardcover Nonfiction, AUDITION by Barbara Walters.

I thank you for welcoming me so warmly and for making me immediately feel like a member of the Random House family. I look forward to a long and great collaboration with you.

Yours,
Markus Dohle