Game of Thrones

Will Tony Hall's tenure as DG of the BBC be strategic or tactical ?

He seems to be on a fairly systematic series of interviews with 'players' in the current organisation. Time has certainly been spent with King of the North, Peter Salmon, at Salford - and Peter has mused on the discussions with Broadcast, suggesting that the way things are run at MediaCityUK avoids the cultural clashings of fiefdoms and their barons in London. Those warring barons and their styles have been brought into sharp relief by the Pollard Report - and are likely to be seen in high definition when the annexes are finally published.

Unfortunately, the Salford model - with a boss of whoever happens to be in a geographical patch - no longer works for London, as everyone is piling in to new Broadcasting House. It's very hard to imagine a single boss sitting on top of Vision, Audio & Music and News, reporting in to the DG.

And when Peter Salmon asserts for Salford "One thing we do is have a great management culture", there'll be a little tittering in London about how often some of those managers are elsewhere.

Nonetheless, Lord Patten, and his previous best boy, George Entwistle, had plans to restructure the way the organisation is run. So desperate were the BBC Trust to secure Tone that he'll have a free hand to do things the way he wants - or almost.

The reality is that he needs to stabilise his Executive Board before any thought of restructuring. The Directors of Vision and Audio & Music are acting; the CFO is on the way out. And, as is now the case at The Times, the non-executives have woken from their slumbers in a crisis, and are enjoying having opinions and being difficult. Our Tone needs get control - and has few places he can bring new, supportive, blood in.  A narrower, simpler structure now would make the task almost impossible.

So, increasingly, my answer to the opening question - tactical. This is probably the time for safe hands, rather than radical reform.

• There are now also some significant roles to fill at BBC News. Autograph books are being prepared for the departing Number 2, Stephen Mitchell. Yesterday, the long-serving head of foreign newsgathering, Jon Williams, announced he's moving to (American) ABC. Newsnight still has an acting editor. And though the Controller 5 Live reports to Peter Salmon in the warm managerial bath of Salford Quays, News will have a say in choosing a successor to Adrian Van Klaveren. It's why the network was set up (by Tony Hall ?) after all....