As a head of an innovation laboratory at the biggest quality daily newspaper in Poland, Gazeta Wyborcza, Grzegorz Piechota explores advances in digital technologies, changes in social behaviour and implements the best practices in innovation management.
Piechota is an experienced editor and news media executive of one of the most successful media companies in Eastern Europe. Piechota began his career at Gazeta in 1996 as a reporter in one of the smallest local offices rising to a news editor and a vice-president of Agora Foundation.
From 2011 to 2013 he run a major redesign of Gazeta’s newsroom organisation and workflows. It included introductions of a real-time news desk, a 24/7 social media desk, and an innovative editorial data analytics.
In the past year he led editorial development and readers interactions, and was responsible for a series of successful launches of new magazines and websites on health, personal finance, science. He also supervised investigative and crowd-sourcing journalism projects of which some won international news media awards.
Piechota is a board member of Dallas-based International News Media Association -- a worldwide network of 7,000+ media executives -- and was the first ever editor that served as its European board's president for two terms.
He is an active member of the World Association of Newspapers and News Publishers, the Online News Association, the Global Editors Network and the Interaction Design Foundation.
He organises a major annual digital journalism event in Poland (Digital Journalism Days) and a journalism hackathon (Editors’ Lab) together with Paris-based GEN.
He gives lectures and runs workshops for independent journalists in countries like Belgium, Germany, Estonia, Lithuania, Russia, Switzerland, Tunisia, or Ukraine.
Piechota graduated in law. He is married with two small children and lives in Warsaw.