Our Team
Doug Smith
Table Stakes architect, WAN-IFRA Associate Consultant
Doug Smith is the co-CEO of Strategic Doing Networks. He is acknowledged as one of the world’s leading management thinkers and advisers and has contributed to performance results, innovation, strategy and change in scores of organisations across more than sixty industries in all three sectors: private, government and non-profit.
Doug is the architect of the principles and design for Challenge-Centric, Performance-Driven Transformation Programmes (SM) guiding leaders to use a focus on performance results to drive innovation, capacity-building, and growth in organisations and communities undergoing profound disruption.
Valérie Arnould
Coach, Table Stakes Europe
Deputy Director, Digital Revenue Network, WAN-IFRA
After a decade working as a journalist covering the media industry (press, radio, TV and advertising), Valérie joined WAN-IFRA in 1997 as editor-in-chief of its French magazine, then deputy editor-in-chief for all languages, while also working on research projects (e.g. Alternative revenue streams for publishers; Paid digital content). Since 2014, she has worked on WAN-IFRA’s executive programs (the last five years with Table Stakes Europe), conference programming (the Digital Media Europe series, the World News Media Congress) and consultancy projects for WAN-IFRA members. Valérie holds a Master's degree from the Institut Français de Presse (University Paris II) and a Master's degree in Political Science (Paris II).
Prof. Dr Alexandra Borchardt
Coach, Table Stakes Europe
Journalist, Advisor, Researcher, Book author
Alexandra Borchardt is a senior journalist, book author, lecturer, and independent media advisor. She works as a coach for the World Association of News Publishers (WAN-IFRA) in their Table Stakes Europe Programme on the digital transformation of newsrooms and for Hamburg Media School, where she heads the Journalism Innovators Program. She is also affiliated with the Reuters Institute for the Study of Journalism at the University of Oxford as a Senior Research Associate after having served as Director of Leadership Programmes until 2019. Prior to this she was managing editor of Süddeutsche Zeitung (SZ), Germany’s leading quality daily. Alexandra is the lead author of the 2021/22 EBU News Report “What’s Next? Public Service Journalism in the Age of Distraction, Opinion, and Information Abundance”, published by the European Broadcasting Union in November 2021.
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As a honorary Professor for Leadership and Digital Transformation at TU Munich’s TUM School of Management Alexandra regularly teaches “Leadership and Strategy in the 21st Century”. Until September 2021 she was professor for media transformation and co-head of the master’s program in cultural journalism at the University of the Arts in Berlin. She gives keynotes on digital transformation and the media and publishes commentaries, essays, and a monthly column for the industry publication Medieninsider. She is the author of Mehr Wahrheit wagen – Warum die Demokratie einen starken Journalismus braucht (Dare more truth – Why democracy needs strong journalism), Dudenverlag, 2020, and Mensch 4.0 – Frei bleiben in einer digitalen Welt (Freedom in a digital world), Random House, 2018.
She is a member of the Committee for Editorial Independence at Czech publishing house Economia and a board member of Constructive Foundation in Aarhus. At the Council of Europe she served as a rapporteur on the Committee of Experts on Freedom of Expression and Digital Technologies until September 2021 and prior to that as vice chair on the Committee of Experts on Quality Journalism in the Digital Age.
At SZ she held leadership roles in the politics and business sections. She was also founding editor of Süddeutsche’s ‘Plan W’, an award-winning quarterly magazine for women and business. Before joining SZ she worked for Financial Times Deutschland and Deutsche Presse-Agentur.
Alexandra holds a Ph.D. in Political Science from Tulane University, New Orleans (1994), and in 2013 completed a Programme for Management Development at IESE Business School, Barcelona.
Stéphane Mayoux
Coach, Table Stakes Europe
Stéphane's professional DNA is rooted in 25 years of BBC international journalism. He went into broadcast media after a pan-European MBA that took him from France to the UK and Germany. He has spent more than half his life abroad, including post-apartheid South Africa and likes to call himself a serial foreigner. He puts warmth, authenticity and performance at the centre of his coaching work. He enjoys looking at events and the world from as many perspectives as possible and very much welcomes coaching clients from diverse frames of reference. He has co-designed and co-facilitated workshops focusing on Diversity, Equity and Inclusion within and outside the media industry.
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Stéphane was part of the coaching team that launched Table Stakes Europe in 2019. He has been working with TSE clients in France, Spain, Portugal, Germany, Switzerland, Austria and Sweden.
For over 20 years, he produced and then edited BBC radio and television programmes about Africa, for Africa and from an African perspective. Before he stepped aside to focus on digital transformation, he was the editor of Focus on Africa TV on BBC World Television.
Stéphane has managed the launch of new programmes and developed new platforms. He has recruited and nurtured talent in the UK and overseas as well as built and managed multi-cultural teams through change. Stéphane has also devised and delivered training programmes in London, Africa, Asia and the Middle East.
Before leaving the BBC to join Table Stakes Europe, Stéphane co-designed and co-delivered three years of digital change workshops within BBC News.
Stéphane is a fully accredited psychotherapist and sees individual clients in his private practice in London. He strongly believes his therapy practice informs and enriches his executive coaching work.
Stéphane holds a Masters in Business Management from one of France’s leading business schools, ESCP. He also holds an MSc in Psychotherapy from the Metanoia Institute/Middlesex University in the UK.
Pepe Cerezo Gilarranz
Coach, Table Stakes Europe
Digital strategist. Specialist in digital journalism, online media and new business models
More than 15 years in the world of new technologies, online business development and digital transformation of media organizations. Cerezo has worked as a consultant for the main media in Spain and Latin America. He was director of research and digital strategy at Prisa between 2007 and 2012. Has extensive knowledge on digital business, reader revenue, marketing and online advertising, and web analytics and wide experience in the implementation and development of digital projects through their strategic design, planning, implementation and monitoring phases. Is the author of the books: The Liquid Media, the transformation of business models (2018), and Subscription Models in the Press (2019). He is also a professor of “Organization and Management and Information Companies” at the University Carlos III of Madrid.
Lyndsey Jones
Coach, Table Stakes Europe, WAN-IFRA Associate Consultant, Digital Strategist, Author
Lyndsey Jones is a digital transformation consultant, strategist and coach, working with media groups worldwide either independently or via WAN-IFRA, Women in News, FT Strategies and other consultancy agencies.
She coaches media groups on reader revenue models, business transformation, AI, diversity, content strategy and audience growth, as part of programmes such as WAN-IFRA’s Table Stakes Europe and Stars4Media.
A former executive editor of the Financial Times, she is the author of ‘Going Digital: What it takes for smoother transformations’, named as one of the best business books in 2022 by the FT.
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Jones is a board advisor on journalism, leadership and innovation at the University of Central Lancashire in the UK as well as a keynote speaker, chairing and presenting international webinars on digital transformation. With an outstanding career and over 20 years working with the FT, she led digital transformation of the newsroom, streamlining operations from print to digital which in turn helped to drive subscriptions and boost revenue. She also created a fellowship to give aspiring journalists from under-represented the opportunity to work at the news group.
Martin Fröhlich
Coach, Table Stakes Europe
Director, Digital Revenue Network, WAN-IFRA
Before joining WAN-IFRA and Table Stakes Europe, Martin Fröhlich was Deputy Head of Newsroom at Redaktionsgemeinschaft OWL and worked at the Neue Westfälische publishing house in Bielefeld for 15 years. He has been in the industry for more than 25 years.
During his career he worked as a reporter, editor, media coach, head of department, project manager, moderator and technical adviser. In the last decade, his focus lay on the digital transformation of editorial processes, products, management and writing. He led several projects in this field and played a key role in the challenge of transforming thinking and doing. Fröhlich also was a media coach at “Die Mehrwertmacher” in Dresden.
Laurel Wennen
Project Manager, WAN-IFRA
Laurel has worked with the Table Stakes Europe programme since joining WAN-IFRA in late 2019. For each cohort in the programme, she organises the five main workshop sessions, both in-person and virtual, as well as smaller group meetings between the workshops.
Beyond Table Stakes Europe, she is part of the Digital Revenue Network team at WAN-IFRA, working on the European and African Digital Media Awards and assists with webinars and other events throughout the year.