There was only one game in town by way of management news from the weekend: the explosive and chaotic fallout of two, Newsnight-related crises at the BBC. One stemmed from a decision by programme bosses last year to shelve an investigation into sex-abuse claims against late TV and radio presenter Jimmy Saville. The other emerged from a move in the opposite direction: to allege on 2 November that a senior Conservative from the Thatcher era had taken part in the sexual abuse of children at North Wales care homes in the 1980s. Those allegations were quickly disproved, with the man at the centre – former Tory Party treasurer Lord Alistair McAlpine – threatening legal action.

At 10pm on Saturday, BBC boss George Entwistle resigned after just 54 days in his post, becoming the shortest-serving director general in the corporation’s history. That was despite basing his leadership on a problem-solving mission to tackle the BBC’s bloated management structure – as Professional Manager reported in September.

The BBC has weathered crises before – but nothing on this scale, and nothing with such enormous implications for its management and leadership. Here is what the papers had to say…

Mail online

As Entwistle departed, so speculation swirled over Lord Patten’s performance as chairman of the BBC Trust – the body in charge of appointing the corporation’s director general. In an interview yesterday morning with Andrew Marr, Patten admitted to the damage that the Newsnight crisis had caused to the BBC’s credibility and pledged that he would get a grip on the organisation with a “radical overhaul” of its management. Meanwhile, Patten’s old friend from the John Major cabinet, David Mellor, suggested that the chairman should consider his position in the wake of Entwistle’s failure to control the agenda.

Guardian

David Cameron has ordered his director of communications, Craig Oliver – a former BBC executive – to provide him with regular updates on the crisis. Reports suggest that Cameron, a supporter of the organisation, fears that the tradition of investigative journalism that it has upheld throughout its history could suffer if its response to the Newsnight crisis is not managed correctly. However, he is not yet of the view that the crisis represents an “existential” threat to the BBC.

Telegraph

The disastrous 2 November Newsnight slot drew the ire of Lord McAlpine’s former colleague, Lord Tebbit. “In short,” he thundered in a special column, “the BBC plot to smear Alistair and Margaret Thatcher was a disgrace that will lower the standing of the BBC until someone cleans out those responsible. Perhaps the chairman might restore his reputation and that of the BBC. Or perhaps not.”

Independent on Sunday

Entwistle’s predecessor as director general, Mark Tompson, is set to begin his new job this week as chief executive of the New York Times – but the paper’s own journalists are unlikely to let him escape scrutiny over events at his former workplace. NYT columnists Margaret Sullivan and Joe Nocera have already lined up to demand that the newspaper’s staff should question Thompson as much as possible about his background role in Newsnight’s Savile probe – and the Indy notes that, as a whole, the NYT “tends to take introspection seriously”.

Sunday Mirror

Apoplexy ruled the day as it emerged that Entwistle stands to receive a £450,000 payoff as part of his severance package – that’s a year’s salary following a tenure of less than two months, to be issued in monthly instalments up to late 2013. It has since come to light that the payoff is central to a special Parliamentary question tabled by deputy Labour leader Harriet Harman, scheduled for debate this afternoon. In Harman’s view, the full-year sum could be construed as a “reward for failure”.

THIS MORNING’S LATEST…

BBC director of news Helen Boaden and her deputy Stephen Mitchell became the latest management casualties of the Newsnight crisis this morning, as it was announced that they have “stepped aside”. They have been replaced by head of news gathering Fran Unsworth and Today programme editor Ceri Thomas. Meanwhile, Ian Overton – managing editor at the Bureau of Investigative Journalism, which assisted in Newsnight’s McAlpine report – has resigned from the group with immediate effect.

Amid that further turbulence, acting BBC director general Tim Davie is set to announce plans for rebuilding public trust in the organisation…