Kordiam's Partner Manager Robert Dönges on How Editorial Planning and Publishing Grow Together Seamlessly

Robert Dönges is Partner and Integration Manager at Kordiam and is responsible for the technical collaboration with Purple. In this interview, he talks about where editorial planning still fails due to system gaps, what bi-directional synchronization between Kordiam and Purple changes in practice, what the journey from Story Card to finished CMS draft actually looks like, and which developments will shape newsrooms in 2026.

The Challenge: When Planning Fails at System Gaps

Modern newsrooms juggle complexity and speed at the same time. Where does planning break down first in your experience, and how does Kordiam manage to "make complexity visible where it helps — and keep it invisible where it doesn't"?

Planning breaks down most often due to disconnected systems and inconsistent metadata. When editorial teams work with spreadsheets, multiple calendars, or ad-hoc documents, critical information lives in different places and then deadlines are missed or assignments are duplicated. Kordiam balances complexity by making essential planning elements highly visible to editorial leads — such as story priorities, audiences, publication windows, and tasks — while keeping the interface clean and context-appropriate for reporters. In the Story Card, editorial leads can see all planning fields, deadlines, audiences, task assignments, and sync status at a glance.

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From your recent work with a German regional publisher: what pain points were they able to leave behind, and which early wins showed up fastest?

The regional publisher came from a fragmented tool landscape that made it impossible to get a newsroom-wide overview of upcoming work. The biggest pain points eliminated early were lack of transparency, siloed editorial plans, and manual coordination overhead. With Kordiam, they gained a shared planning environment where every desk can see what others are working on. This reduces overlaps and enables better collaboration. The fastest wins included clearer editorial alignment, less time spent chasing updates, and a sense of control over upcoming stories. Editorial leads told us they now spend less time on planning logistics and more time on the quality of reporting.

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Many teams try to simply import legacy workflows into new tools. What is your advice for rethinking workflows instead?

Legacy workflows are often based on traditional working methods shaped by print, and they reflect workarounds — not streamlined processes. Our advice is: rethink the workflow based on editorial goals, not tool habits. Start by asking: What outcomes do we want to optimize? Do we need timely publication? Better audience targeting? Less rework? Once you know the outcome, design the workflow around that purpose — then adapt the tools to support it, not the other way around. Tools like Kordiam are most effective when teams use them as coordination hubs rather than dumping old processes into them unchanged. This often means simplifying steps, removing redundant status updates, and using metadata fields from the start (not after publication) — so editorial leads and reporters always have shared context.

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What Kordiam Brings: The Role of the Partnership with Purple

What do publishers achieve with the combination of Kordiam + Purple that standalone tools cannot deliver?

By combining planning (Kordiam) and publishing (Purple), publishers get a continuous editorial workflow — from idea to plan to CMS draft to publication — without duplicate work and without friction between planning and publishing. Standalone tools often stop at planning or only sync partial data. With the integration, planned stories are created directly in Purple — complete with metadata, status, audiences, and scheduled publication dates. Updates sync bi-directionally, so what's in the CMS always reflects the current planning status. This eliminates manual data entry and guarantees a single source of truth for status and content metadata.

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Which Kordiam capabilities create the biggest impact once connected to Purple's headless CMS?

The biggest impact comes from bi-directional syncing and content metadata enforcement. Planned stories flow into Purple with all fields already populated — saving hours of manual input. At the same time, changes made directly in Purple flow back to Kordiam. This reduces errors, avoids version drift, and keeps editorial planning aligned with what is actually published.

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Workflow Integration and Concrete Impact

Can you walk us from a Kordiam Story Card to a Purple draft? What exactly travels, what syncs back, and where do newsrooms feel the time savings?

When a story is created in Kordiam and assigned to a Purple platform, the following happens:

• Title, description, scheduled publication date, publication status, and additional custom fields are automatically transferred to Purple
• Purple creates a draft post with this information pre-filled
• Updates in Kordiam (e.g., status changes, deadline shifts) sync to Purple. Editorial changes in Purple can sync back to Kordiam to keep the plan current

Newsrooms save time because no one has to manually recreate the story in the CMS or re-enter metadata — everything is automated and always up to date.

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How do Kordiam's upload links and content metadata enforcement reduce errors and protect CMS access?

Kordiam's upload links allow reporters and freelancers to submit stories directly into the planning tool. Editorial planners can review submitted content before passing it on to Purple. Content metadata enforcement ensures that every story contains the information required for publication, so editorial standards are consistently met.

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Outlook: What's Coming in the Next 12 Months

Over the next 12 months: what are your highest roadmap priorities, and how will your new AI tool strengthen Kordiam as the planning source of truth?

Over the coming 12 months, our roadmap focuses on strengthening Kordiam as the newsroom's central planning source of truth — through more structured planning, better visibility, and stronger foundations for future AI support. Key priorities include the new Story Card, which replaces the previous detail page with a unified interface, and story templates that help teams plan more consistently across desks. AI is not yet embedded directly in Kordiam, but in 2026 we are launching Skimmr, our AI-powered story discovery engine. Skimmr surfaces overlooked source material to support deeper story development, while Kordiam remains the central place where editorial decisions, priorities, and execution are coordinated. Together, these initiatives reinforce Kordiam's role as a trusted planning partner — not just a planning tool.

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What are you currently seeing across newsrooms: which shifts will define 2026 the most, and how is Kordiam positioning editorial teams to win in that environment?

The major shifts are data-informed planning, cross-platform synchronization, and AI-assisted workflows. Newsrooms that break down silos between planning and publishing will outperform those that keep these functions separate. Kordiam positions teams for success by being the single source of truth for editorial work, integrating deeply with publishing platforms like Purple, and laying the foundations to bring AI into planning — so teams can react faster, plan smarter, and publish with more confidence.

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About Kordiam

Kordiam is a specialized planning tool for newsrooms, magazine teams, broadcasters, and communications departments. It enables structured, transparent workflows — from strategic topic planning and editorial conferences through to task management and publication. Founded in Hamburg in 2011 by Matthias Kretschmer — originally under the name Desk-Net — Kordiam has grown into a team of over 40 and works with more than 250 media and communications brands worldwide. Customers include The Times, RTL, Süddeutsche Zeitung, and Badische Neueste Nachrichten. According to industry publisher kress pro, Kordiam is the most widely used planning tool in newsrooms across Germany, Austria, and Switzerland.

The integration between Kordiam and Purple is already successfully in use with several publishing customers such as Börsen-Zeitung and OM-Medien, creating end-to-end workflows without media breaks.