Des Moines Business Record seeks editor

The locally-owned Business Record is seeking an experienced and skilled editor with excellent planning, organizational and process management skills, who can direct our newsroom’s coverage of the Greater Des Moines business community.

This person would lead a staff of three senior reporters and a newsroom operations manager, and collaborate with our company’s full-time copy editor, photographer and design team to produce our weekly B2B print news magazine, as well as an array of digital insider content and daily enewsletters.

The editor will be the primary news decision maker and will be tasked with informing, enriching and connecting the business community by advancing and leading conversation through our unique in-depth analysis of the people, challenges, trends, industries, best practices and initiatives that are of vital importance to those doing business in Central Iowa.

Major responsibilities include:

– Leading the informed, level-headed conversation of our business community through our content and products.

– Leading day-to-day operations of producing print and electronic versions of the publication.

– Long-term planning and execution of the editorial strategy for the organization.

– Working closely with reporters to identify and develop story ideas for compelling, in-depth and unique content.

– Editing stories, and proofing pages.

– Directing the daily news coverage in our digital products.

– Creating new and innovative story formats for both digital and print.

– Utilizing new technologies to tell, produce and deliver stories in innovative ways.

– Collaborating to create new digital and print products for our business community.

– Working closely with the design team and staff photographer to elevate the visual presentation of our products in print and online.

– Writing occasional feature stories and news items.

– Representing the organization at both company events and at critical community events.

– Coordinating and facilitating the distribution and promotion of content across our full array of products and social channels.

– Keeping a finger on the pulse of the needs, challenges and major initiatives of the business community.

– Serving as the newsroom’s primary contact point for the business community.

– Assessing situations, to determine the importance, urgency and risks and make clear decisions which are timely and in the best interest of the organization.

Skills & traits required:

– Highly organized: Set priorities, build timelines and monitor the progress of multiple ongoing long-range and short-range team projects.

– Planning: Ability to make, execute and lead others with long-range coverage plans.
– Problem solver: Assess problem situations to identify causes, gather and process relevant information, generate possible solutions and make recommendations and/or resolve the problem.

– Technological savvy: Demonstrate mastery of standard office technologies and utilize new technologies to aid coverage and process efficiency.

– Deadline oriented: Ability to meet deadlines and foster a deadline oriented newsroom, while managing time and completing tasks within a decided time frame.

Foster teamwork: Work cooperatively and effectively with your team and others in the company to set goals, resolve problems and make decisions.

– Flexibility and adaptability: Ability to adjust and calibrate a plan or work process given changes to strategy or available resources.

– Editing: Enjoys and relishes working through others to help reporters elevate the quality of their ideas and final copy, while ensuring a clean, factual and clear final product.

– Strong visual skills – Thinks strategically about using visuals and enhancements – sidebars, graphs, photos, infographics – to elevate the visual appeal of our products.

– Team management: Ability to utilize team members strengths, understand weaknesses and be in tune with the staff’s workload to help the team operate at its optimal level, while putting team members in the best possible position to do their jobs.

Benefits:

– Four weeks paid time off, with increases over time.

– Flexible work hour arrangements.

– Profit sharing.

– Free downtown parking.

– Group life, short-term and long-term disability coverage

– Group medical insurance

– Group dental insurance

– 401(k) plan access

How to apply:

Please submit to Business Record Publisher Chris Conetzkey at chrisconetzkey@bpcdm.com the following: Resume, cover letter, 2-3 clips of your own writing and/or 2-3 clips of work you helped edit and produce.