Today’s Golfer is my favourite magazine.If you didn’t work in the media what would you do?I would run a golf resort – I was once asked but I turned it down.Name the one career ambition you want to realise before you retireEdit a newspaper in the US.Who in the media do you most admire and why?John Humphrys for his integrity and tenacity.The CV1974 Is one of two out of 2,000 entrants to win a bursary to journalism course. We caught her out with her secret love Hasnet Khan but I allowed her to persuade me she was just interested in his work (while leaving his flat at 3am).At home, what do you tune in to?BBC News, Sky News, ITN and GMTV.What is your Sunday paper? And do you have a favourite magazine?Sunday Times for its news and sections, the tabloids for sport and gossip. and getting into West Ham for free!And the worst?The 24/7 commitment means I don’t see enough of my wife Marina, six-year-old daughter Alice and son William, four, and when I do I am often on the phone.How do you feel you influence the media?I only take on clients with a good story to tell, so I hope I contribute to the media with a string of fascinating stories.What’s the proudest achievement in your working life?Winning seven awards and building a one-million circulation gap over the joint sales of the Sunday Mirror and The People while editor of the News of the World.And what’s your most embarrassing moment?Falling for the charm of Princess Diana while I was editor of the News of the World. I advise clients such as West Ham United, Bill Kenwright, Hello! magazine and Carole Caplin.What media do you turn to first thing in the morning?Radio 4, The Sun, the Daily Mirror, the Daily Mail and The Guardian/Independent depending on its front page.Do you consult any media sources during the working day?Sky News, Evening Standard, CNN website.What is the best thing about your job?The knowledge that every morning I don’t get paid unless I get results… His reports would begin something like: “As the clouds gathered over the North Bank stand and a hushed crowd took a collective deep breath, Geoff Hurst gathered the ball and placed it on the snow-white penalty spot.” There was none of the modern-day habit for just saying “and Hurst scored from the spot” Hoby put the reader in the stand with him. It was a lesson that held me in good stead when feature writing.And what were your favourite TV and radio programmes?Panorama, News at Ten and The Big Match.Describe your jobI run a media and PR company called Phil Hall Associates. “Our traditional readers were saying that’s what we call it anyway, it should never have changed its name in 1967,” says Dyson, before adding: “But for the modern readers, we need to grab their attention.”.

So what inspired you to embark on a career in the media?

I wanted to work in the media from the age of 10. My inspiration then was to travel and get in to see my favourite football club West Ham United for free.
When you were 15 years old, which newspaper did your family get, and did you read it?The Sunday Express and its chief football writer Alan Hoby were why I wanted to become a newspaper man He engendered excitement and made it all so glamorous. Dyson makes no bones about a front page that looks “colourful and magaziney” with “a minimum of 10 entry points on the front”.The editor was the guest of Birmingham broadcasting stalwart Ed Doolan last Friday, fielding calls from readers. “In recent years, white men sitting round tables in newspapers have sometimes made too much of a tokenisation of covering ethnic issues,” he says.The Mail, like most big city papers, has traditionally struggled to find the diversity of staff and the relationships with all communities that would ensure a level playing field in terms of the evaluation of the day’s news.Dyson has, however, created a new Central Birmingham edition, covering neighbourhoods such as Aston, Handsworth and Sparkhill, which all have large minority ethnic populations.The heavily editionalised news will be backed up by a range of new sections on subjects such as Family Life and Shopping. We are publishing the full courts convictions lists, so that people will know who’s in court from their area, everything from dodging TV licences to flashing on the bus. Real local stuff.”The only thing we are unique at is our local coverage, but we had started to turn people away.

They were phoning about their 40th anniversary celebrations and we were saying: ‘Sorry, we haven’t got the room for that.’ “Birmingham has a rarely publicised divide between north and south. “In Birmingham, you’re either from the north or the the south and never the twain shall meet,” says Dyson “We’ve never had two editions in Birmingham before. People were turning off the newspaper saying: ‘There’s nothing about my area.’ “After considerable market research and in spite of the fact that Birmingham will be one of the first cities in the UK to have a non-white majority population, Dyson has chosen not to tailor editorial to suit different ethnic groups. “We are publishing planning applications again for every single area. “Trinity Mirror has to take sight of some of the mistakes that have been made in budget cuts,” he says. Dyson is also doubling the number of editions (reduced by Trinity Mirror to save money).There are seven new editions, chosen geographically, and each one will have a minimum of five local stories “When I say local, I mean grass roots,” he says.

That means “re-populating” satellite offices in places such as Sutton Coldfield, Solihull, Redditch and Tamworth. They need to be good at what they are good at, which is local news.” He has immediately reversed the previous Trinity Mirror (the Mail became part of Mirror Group in 1997) strategy of paring down staff numbers to improve profit margins. “We have to challenge everything we do,” he says.The newspaper of Britain’s second city has a circulation of just 94,339. This is my old paper and I’ve come back to it and it needs completely reinventing.” Dyson, a Brummie, who returned to the Mail two months ago, after a successful spell editing a Trinity Mirror stablemate, the Teesside Evening Gazette, is intent on “reinventing” the paper that he grew up reading. We are the worst-performing metropolitan-sized newspaper,” says Steve Dyson.