Publish and Flourish

By E. Bruce Hallett, President

Character counts at TIME. I guess that's what you would expect from us as a journalistic enterprise, but it's equally true for us who work on the business side of this great magazine.

So, on the one hand, that's why I am so reluctant to say farewell to Jack Haire, who has been TIME's publisher since 1993. Jack is leaving TIME to become president of the Fortune Group, overseeing the business affairs of our kid-brother business magazine, FORTUNE, and its kid brother, YOUR COMPANY. Jack and some part of the rest of the world view this as an elevation. I'm free to disagree. But then, Jack's my friend. He is going on to these so-called greener pastures because of the terrific job he's done here at TIME. He's increased ad pages and revenues and helped the business reach record levels of profitability. And we thank him for that.

But it is important to say that Jack's success comes to him because Leo Durocher was wrong: Nice guys do finish first. Among media and advertising professionals, Jack is admired for his passion for his customers, his love of TIME and for the bond of his word. Across the staff at TIME, there was a similar respect, built on the generosity of affection Jack showed toward the people who worked with him. His sincerity and thoughtfulness seemed unexpected of a person in such a big job. But it was one of the things that makes Jack special.

There's another thing, too, that Jack's wife Kathy says is his most enduring and endearing quality: his humility. "It's what I noticed about him first when I met him 20 years ago. This was a guy who had his head screwed on right. He knew what was important and what wasn't. And he came with this deep humility, this deep respect for other people."

So if character was a key to the success of the departing publisher, it is no less central to the choice of our new one. Ed McCarrick--his wife Pat insists on calling him Edward--is returning to TIME and a job he has aspired to from the moment he joined the company as a junior salesperson in Boston in 1973 to his most recent posting as the publisher of LIFE. And I couldn't be more enthusiastic about having Ed back.

Ed grew up in a family that read and respected TIME--notwithstanding the fact that his dad worked for U.S. News & World Report. "Returning to TIME as its publisher is a dream come true," says McCarrick, 49. "I wake up in the morning and rub my eyes, thinking it can't really have happened." While his impressive record at LIFE made Ed a logical candidate for the TIME job, it was other things that won him the prize. "Edward's got his life in balance," says Pat. "His family, his church and TIME are what's important--and in that order."

Pat...excuse me, Patricia, and Ed...excuse me, Edward, met on a blind date in 1968, but it wasn't until 1975 that they went down the aisle. "I married him because of his ethics. He's a good man, with a clear idea of what's right and what's wrong. And if it's wrong, he won't do it, no matter how it might benefit him personally."

But she also remembered one other thing about Ed from their teenage days, "Even though I was an Air Force brat, moving around all of the TIME, Edward would find me, whether or not I wanted to be found," she said.

Let that stand as fair warning to the ad community.