Discourage ties, bureaucracy, memorandums and second-guessing print editors. Encourage creative, daring approaches to online storytelling. The biggest disadvantage newspapers face is their reputation for being top-down and resistant to new ideas. That's very attractive to employees. Pay your people what they're worth.
Newspapers often pay their online workers markedly less than their print staffers.
That says something about the company's values. New media companies may not pay higher salaries, but they usually offer stock options, which can be a terrific inducement. Don't just hit a button and send your stories into cyberspace. Encourage your staffers to engage in a dialogue with the community. That sort of instant feedback becomes addictive pretty quickly.