The Bangor Daily News is seeking a skilled senior editor to lead coverage of coastal Maine and other topics.
The ideal candidate is an experienced editor with a track record of directing ambitious journalism that drives impact, grows audiences and wins awards. But we’d also consider accomplished reporters looking for the next step in their careers.
In this role, you’d supervise six employees and help them identify trends and shape coverage strategies. You should be an excellent line editor, but that’s only part of the job. Editors here work closely with reporters during the story generation and reporting process to establish ledes and nut grafs, identify sources and understand what job the story is doing for the reader.
You would also coach reporters to help them advance in their careers here, which means identifying training opportunities and giving regular feedback on progress toward company and professional goals.
The central role of this position is to direct news coverage of coastal Maine, roughly from Portland to Calais. It’s a fascinating and desirable area with a high quality of life and tons of great stories. We see this is a major growth region for us, and we’re looking for someone who can hit the ground running and help reporters to get big scoops and execute major projects that get us noticed.
The position is based anywhere on the coast, but the editor would need to regularly travel to meet with reporters and to our home office in Bangor.
If you’re the right person for this challenge, this is how we would describe you:
- You can write a killer web headline.
- You’re energized by a fast-paced environment.
- You live to break stories.
- You omit needless words.
- You’re an expert communicator who treats colleagues with respect and maturity.
- You know how to create a collaborative environment for reporters and other editors.
- You love working with others to serve a local audience.
- You’re a self-starter who moves fast and, sometimes, breaks stuff.
- You have excellent critical thinking skills and a deep respect for the mission of journalism.
- You are obsessed with finding ways to better serve your audience and can’t wait to try new things.
- You’re really good at teaching staff new skills.
You’d be joining a large, and growing, statewide news organization in its fourth generation of local ownership. We believe that there’s a bright future for local newsrooms that invest in good journalism and put their audiences first. This role is a key and influential part of that plan.
Job Responsibilities:
- Lead and manage your team and contribute to a healthy newsroom culture.
- Assign and direct individual stories and reporting projects that offer BDN readers up-to-the-minute news and the emerging, important trends that affect their lives.
- Understand your topics or regions thoroughly so stories are knowledgeable and advance our audience’s understanding.
- Use strong editing skills to help reporters develop the point of a story and demonstrate clearly to the audience why it matters.
- Use analytics tools to understand our audience and its needs. Interpret data and report and act on the results.
- Achieve audience goals using multiple paths.
- Stay informed on the latest direction of the news industry. Regularly work with other editors to advance the newsroom and company goals.
Job specifications:
- Several years experience in journalism
- Strong leadership skills
- Ability to work on multiple projects with different focuses in quick succession
- Attention to detail
- Ability and willingness to learn
If you think you might be our next great hire, please submit your resume and cover letter to jdyer@bangordailynews.com.
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