Crain’s Detroit Business is seeking an experienced, highly motivated reporter to cover small and emerging businesses in metro Detroit. This is a key beat. Metro Detroit is highly diverse, racially and ethnically, and coverage will focus on how small business and the local economy respond to the fallout from the COVID-19 pandemic and a national reckoning over issues of race and equity. The ideal candidate will have at least five years’ reporting experience, an eye for compelling stories and the ability to juggle breaking news and in-depth enterprise. Applicants should know, or be willing to learn, how to interpret complex financial information. Also required: comfort with social media and a drive to stand out in a competitive news environment.
Responsibilities
- Write breaking news for Crain’s website, and analytical trend and enterprise pieces for the weekly print issue
- Shoot photos and video as needed
- Participate in Crain’s live & virtual events and advise on custom media projects as needed
Basic Qualifications
- 5 + years of experience in journalism
- Bachelor’s degree
- Skilled at generating story ideas, writing cleanly and coherently, developing sources, breaking news, and working quickly with minimum supervision
- Experience writing for all platforms: digital, print, newsletters
- Experience writing analytical trend and enterprise pieces as well as breaking news stories
- Understanding of financial and business terminology
- Ability to travel as needed
- Ability to work in newsroom during standard office hours and as needed outside of those hours
- Portfolio / examples of recent and relevant work that demonstrates business journalism experience
Preferences
- Experience covering metro Detroit business, real estate and/or economic development
- Familiarity with Crain’s Detroit Business coverage and style — what and who we cover
- A robust list of business community sources
- Experience and/or interest in developing public speaking skills, as our team occasionally participates in panels and events
To apply, go here.
Chris RoushChris Roush was the dean of the School of Communications at Quinnipiac University in Hamden, Connecticut. He was previously Walter E. Hussman Sr. Distinguished Professor in business journalism at UNC-Chapel Hill. He is a former business journalist for Bloomberg News, Businessweek, The Atlanta Journal-Constitution, The Tampa Tribune and the Sarasota Herald-Tribune. He is the author of the leading business reporting textbook "Show me the Money: Writing Business and Economics Stories for Mass Communication" and "Thinking Things Over," a biography of former Wall Street Journal editor Vermont Royster.