Vacancy: Senior Editor, Inclusive Story-telling
Start-date: As soon as possible
Location: Remote, with ability to work within standard CET business hours part of each day
Hours: Full-time
About the role
You will be the lead in more systematically bringing the perspectives of those with lived experience of humanitarian crises into our newsroom, editorial processes and our multiplatform coverage. You will do this by building out and mentoring our existing network of local freelance contributors and by working with local communities to ensure that their narratives anchor our coverage.
You will have four areas of focus:
- Building out and fostering a community of local contributors: You will ensure that our reporting leverages the insights and perspectives that only local journalists can bring. You will identify and recruit contributors in our coverage areas; create guidelines and online training sessions; establish consistent communications in the form of regular newsletters, dedicated freelancer pages on our site, and online gatherings; and work with local contributors to deliver content.
- Establishing and running a fellowship program: You will be the driving force behind an annual program that invites a journalist from the Global South to report stories from their community.
- Establishing and running an internship program: You will help develop the diverse talent of the future through a program that targets students from universities in the regions we cover.
- Developing new forms of story-telling that engage the communities we cover: You will explore formats that challenge some of the Western-centric narrative habits of traditional journalism; that are more welcoming to non-native English speakers; and that allow the communities we cover to co-create content with us.
Reporting to the Executive Editor, you will work closely with our 15-person editorial team.
Who we’re looking for
You have significant experience as a working journalist, ideally in one or more of our regional or topical coverage areas. You are passionate about mentoring other journalists, a passion you have tapped as a great editor, newsroom leader, media trainer or professor. You welcome innovation, aren’t afraid of failure, and are platform agnostic.
You have strong intercultural skills, feel at ease in a more networked, decentralised approach to working, and have a management style of stewardship rather than control.
You are ambitious and visionary but entrepreneurial and resourceful enough to succeed without all the support systems of bigger organisations.
You are humble and share our journalistic and organisational values: As journalists, we believe our first responsibility is to those at the heart of crisis zones whose voices our work seeks to amplify.
We especially welcome candidates who are excited by the challenge of building a progressive, forward-looking organisation that models a new, decolonised form of journalism.
Experience and background:
- Substantial professional experience as a journalist or some combination of journalism, media training, and/or media innovation
- Experience or strong interest in mentorship and training
- Strong networks within media in the regions TNH covers
- Strong spoken and written English
- Adept and agile hands-on text editing skills
Desirables:
- Multiple languages, particularly French, Arabic and/or Spanish,or other languages widely used in key TNH coverage areas
- Experience working internationally; and in regional or international newsrooms
- Experience working in start-ups
- Multimedia reporting and editing skills
- Experience developing or running fellowship or internship programs
- Experience managing reporters or other newsroom staff
- Networks among diaspora communities
- Experience reporting on humanitarian issues or working in the humanitarian sector
Core competencies:
Alignment with TNH’s organisational values: You are committed, humble, candid, constructive, accountable, and you embrace diversity.
Mentorship: You get satisfaction out of helping others succeed. You are a natural coach. You are patient and nurturing. You see the best in people and work with them to leverage their strengths.
Universality: You do not see the practice of journalism through a purely Western lens. You are open to different forms of the craft and value the qualities that different types of journalists bring.
Innovation: You are creative. You embrace and drive forward new ideas, approaches and ways of working. You see opportunities where others don’t.
Agility: You recognise the world is changing fast and are able to thrive amid uncertainty. You are flexible enough to adapt to evolving demands of the job and try different approaches before deciding what works best.
Resilience: You’ve got grit. You don’t give up easily. You push through difficulty and are proactive in seeking solutions to challenges.
We have described the qualities we are seeking in this position, but we recognise that there will be strong candidates who do not meet all the requirements listed here but have other important qualities. Thus, we encourage all interested candidates to apply.
Responsibilities
Freelance journalist network:
- Raise awareness of The New Humanitarian in media circles in the countries we cover
- Working with regional editors, build a network of talented local contributors from the region covers
- When new journalists enter TNH’s orbit, work with them to explain TNH’s editorial process, standards, style, and audience. Edit initial drafts of stories (in text, multimedia or other formats), providing detailed feedback aimed at helping journalists develop and be ready to deliver publication-ready content.
- Devise consistent communications to nurture the freelancer network and build a sense of community, which may include a newsletter, dedicated freelancer pages on the site, online
- training or other convenings.
Fellowship Programme:
- In coordination with the Executive Editor, establish an annual fellowship programme for journalists from the regions TNH covers to tell their communities’ untold stories
- Work with the External Relations team to raise funding for the fellowship programme
- Announce and market the fellowship publicly; work with the Head of People and Culture to attract as broad a pool of candidates as possible
- Establish selection criteria and process
- Work with the successful fellow to produce compelling, high-quality stories that reflect his or her community’s realities
Internship Programme:
- Establish a regular internship programme, including appropriate induction and training tools
- Reach out to universities in the regions TNH covers to establish structured internship relationships
- Oversee the internship programme, including the selection of interns
- Mentor interns during the course of their internship; provide interns with opportunities for growth and development
New story-telling formats
- Develop new products and formats that allow local communities to contribute content that goes beyond a standard voxpox
- Conceive of and organise events like Town Halls or story circles in communities affected by crises to hear directly from them what they would like to see in our journalism
- Co-create new types of products with the communities we cover, such that their concerns and voices contribute even more forcefully to our coverage; they shape the narratives that drive our story-telling, and our formats are more easily accessible to them.
Other
Support other efforts to decolonise TNH’s journalism, including the development of a style guide and in-house presentations or trainings.
How to apply
Send your CV tojobs@thenewhumanitarian.orgsubjectline: Senior Editor for Inclusive Story-telling along with a cover letter outlining your interest in working with TNH; why your past experience is relevant for this role in a small entrepreneurial non-profit; and your initial thoughts on how The New Humanitarian can become a newsroom that is truly inclusive and representative of the communities it covers.
Please note: Due to the high number of applications, only those applicants selected for interviews will be notified.
About The New Humanitarian
The New Humanitarian puts independent journalism at the service of the millions of people affected by humanitarian crises. Our journalists report from the front lines of conflicts and disasters around the world to drive more effective prevention of and response to crises. Our on-the-ground reporting and expert analysis inform policy-makers and practitioners, amplify the voices of those at the heart of crises, and act as a watchdog to hold the aid sector accountable.
Some 300,000 government officials, UN and NGO representatives, journalists, academics and wider audiences interested in understanding crises visit our website every month; 58,000 subscribe to our email newsletter; thousands have downloaded our new podcast, and millions more access our work through social media and republication/citation in mainstream media (BBC, Associated Press, New York Times) and regional media in Asia, Africa and the Middle East. Our journalism has prompted investigations into misconduct, changes in UN policy, and new aid programmes; it has inspired public petitions, donations, and charity telethons; and it has been used as evidence before the International Criminal Court and the UK Parliament’s International Development Committee.
Over the past five years, since our spin-off from the United Nations in 2015, we have established ourselves as the only newsroom worldwide specialised in covering humanitarian crises; constituted a legal entity with an independent board of directors; raised millions of dollars in funding; rebranded from IRIN to The New Humanitarian; sharpened our editorial voice under the leadership of a new Executive Editor from the New York Times; launched an investigations unit and a podcast; begun a membership programme, which has attracted hundreds of paying readers; and put our work on the map in places like TEDx and the World Economic Forum.
Our $2.5 million USD budget is mostly funded by a mix of governments and foundations.
We are registered in the canton of Geneva as a non-profit association under Swiss law.