The CBC has picked Heather Conway, a veteran PR and public affairs exec, to replace Kirstine Stewart and run its TV, radio and online services.

A CBC spokesperson on Thursday morning confirmed that Conway will be named the new EVP of English services and will start in December.

The former CEO of Edelman Canada was also a marketing and public affairs exec for six years at Alliance Atlantis Communications before it was acquired by CanWest Global Communications in 2007.

Her other executive stints include six years at TD Bank and most recently as chief business officer at the Art Gallery of Ontario since September 2011, where Conway was charged with squeezing more revenue from the gift shop and restaurants of the budget-challenged institution.

Those biz-dev skills will be called on at the CBC, which has been looking for a new programming topper since the end of April when Stewart departed to become the head of Twitter Canada.

The federal government last year imposed a $115 million budget chop over three years on the pubcaster, resulting in job and programming cuts and more re-runs as part of the English-language TV lineup.

With files from Dani Ng-See-Quan and Etan Vlessing

From Playback Daily