ViacomCBS Inc. said it would combine the journalistic and business operations of CBS News and CBS Television Stations into one division, and appointed two executives to lead the new unit.
Neeraj Khemlani, an executive at Hearst Corp., and Wendy McMahon, the former president of Walt Disney Co. ’s ABC-owned television stations, will share responsibility for CBS News and CBS Television Stations as co-heads and presidents, CBS parent ViacomCBS said Thursday.
The appointments fill a leadership void left by ViacomCBS executives that have already departed and are looking to depart. Susan Zirinsky, the president of CBS News, is in negotiations for a deal that would keep her at ViacomCBS as a producer.
CBS said earlier this month that Peter Dunn and David Friend, executives at CBS Television Stations, were leaving the company amid an investigation into allegations reported by the Los Angeles Times that the two had fostered a hostile work environment at the TV-station group. Attorneys for the men have denied allegations of misconduct.
In a memo to staff, CBS Entertainment Group Chief Executive George Cheeks said combining the station group and news would “maximize the power of our newsgathering and production operations to serve audiences across all national, digital, local and global platforms.”
