Senior Supervising Editor, Planet Money

OVERVIEW

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NPR’s flagship economics podcast team is looking for an editor deeply steeped in narrative audio with an analytical mind, creative instincts, caring heart who can also land a joke to co-lead our team. Economic expertise will also help. To succeed at this role, you must have familiarity and interest in the subject area(s) of business, economics and/or finance, but also you can’t be so inside it that you can’t talk to the normals anymore. 

This is a dream job for the right person. We have broad creative freedom to tell stories however we need to. Sometimes it’s a moving character narrative, other times it’s field reporting or an expert interview, or trying things for ourselves, like buying 1,000 barrels of oil, or a pile of Christmas trees and seeing what happens when we need to re-sell them. Humor, antics, empathy, pathos, metaphor, and even quizzes or songs — we deploy whatever tools we need to best explain, engage and entertain. 

What we are looking for: Someone with news instincts, narrative audio chops, and leadership experience. Someone who we can spot stories, sharpen scripts; also, offer constructive, rigorous, fair feedback with empathy and kindness; say when something is too obvious, or pat, or pandering; and generally push our staff to grow. If all of that sounds like you, read on. And, insight. Who doesn’t love an editor that injects an extra dose of insight into a script. 

Planet Money has two senior supervising editors who split the show editing duties and share managerial duties with the Executive Producer. (The Indicator has its own editor).  This person will edit roughly half the Planet Money episodes, as well as adaptations for broadcast, web, video and other platforms. 

 

Please carefully read the How To Apply section before applying. 

HOW TO APPLY

All applications must include a resume and cover letter including the following to be considered.  

Please incorporate the following into your application: 

• Give us a sense of your editing experience and your taste and what it’d be like to work with you. 
• How would approach editing at Planet Money specifically? 
• What are a few of your favorite episodes of PM recently and why? 
• What should we do more of? What should we stop doing? How would you make that happen? 
• Definitely let us know what you bring that we might not realize? 
• Include links to work you’ve edited and tell us how your editing changed or improved that work. 
• If you edited a daily/weekly show, tell us about the body of work and how you shaped it over time. This is your chance to brag. 
• We want to understand your taste, where you’d push the show. Take a recent story in the news, or from anywhere else, that could be a Planet Money episode. Tell us why it fits your vision of the show, and how you’d want us to approach it. 

RESPONSIBILITIES

• Manage some of the talented hosts and producers who make Planet Money, helping them grow in their roles and careers, and motivating them to achieve their most creative work.
• Edit episodes, quickly, decisively, with insight, rigor, and kindness. 
• Approve or reject story pitches from staff and freelancers, along with input from editorial staff, and provide clear reasons for your choices.
• As a key co-leader of this consensus-driven team, help set the editorial agenda in collaboration with hosts and other editorial staff, then empower, motivate, and encourage them to achieve goals, creatively removing obstacles along the way.
• Ensure every episode meets our high standards for craft, journalism, tone, and substance.
• Keep the show from sounding boring, predictable, and generic or too precious. 
• Re-writing stories alongside the hosts, including restructuring arcs, sharpening narration, punching up jokes, trimming episodes to time and whatever else is needed, sometimes on tight deadlines, and side-by-side in Zoom for long stretches, sometimes saying, this one is ready, ship it to keep on deadline. 

• Thinking ahead with reporters about getting that dream tape with just the right question, or by being in just the right place.
• Participating in our collaborative group edit process.
• Offering direct, critical feedback with kindness, consideration, and collegiality.
• Embody the team values of kindness, consideration, empathy, inclusivity, diversity, and equity.
• Be ambitious, thinking up large-scale projects for the team to tackle collaboratively.
• Thinking big. Really big. Pushing the ambition of the team on all fronts is key — innovating in craft, format, journalism, narrative, insight, all of it.
• Keeping it fun!

 

The above duties and responsibilities are not an exhaustive list of required responsibilities, duties and skills. Other duties may be assigned, and this job description can be modified at any time.

MINIMUM QUALIFICATIONS

• You at least read/listen/watch some business or economics news for pleasure occasionally. 
• You do not need to be an expert in economics, but you must be curious and interested in the subject area and loosely familiar with the basics of business, economics and/or finance or you will not enjoy the job. (You will need to facilitate nerdy conversations about subject area nuances and ensure precision and accuracy about technical or obscure points in scripts.)
• 7+ years editing longform narrative audio, ideally on a show similar to Planet Money or under similar conditions (tight deadlines, news-adjacent, explanatory.)
• Experience leading a team of journalists, having tough conversations with empathy and kindness, aiding in the professional development of junior staff, motivating a team, maintaining high morale, and infusing the values of diversity, equity, inclusion, and creativity into every aspect of the editorial process.
• 7+ years of experience explaining complicated topics to audiences, as a journalist, writer, teacher or in other settings. 
• 7+ years experience in a deadline news environment (though this job is NOT itself a news job.)
• 5+ Experience editing the work of others.
• Demonstrated experience innovating in storytelling (please share examples.)

 

PREFERRED QUALIFICATIONS

• Daily news production experience or fast-paced newsroom experience.
• Expertise in business, economics and finance. 

 

REQUIRED SKILLS

• Narrative audio editing.
• Good judgment.
• Exacting standards of journalistic ethics. 

EDUCATION REQUIREMENT

There is no education requirement. Formal education is not what matters to us. If you have studied economics or business, or have work experience in those fields, and want to share how it will help you perform the duties above, please include that in your application. 

WORK LOCATION

• Hybrid Permitted: This is a hybrid permitted role. Some aspects of this role include duties that are better performed at an NPR facility. The employee will be required to be onsite at the New York City office at least 10 days a year. The employee must also reside in an NPR supported location based on the number of onsite days they choose.

JOB TYPE

• This is a full-time, exempt position

COMPENSATION

• Salary Range: The U.S. based anticipated salary rate for this opportunity is $136,990 - $173,000 a year. The range displayed reflects the minimum and maximum hourly rate NPR expects to provide for new hires for the position across all US locations.

Does this sound like you? If so, we want to hear from you.

NPR is an Equal Opportunity Employer. NPR is committed to being an inclusive workplace that welcomes diverse and unique perspectives, all working toward the same goal – to create a more informed public. Qualified applicants receive consideration for employment without regard to race, color, ethnicity, national origin, ancestry, age, religion, religious belief, sex (including pregnancy, childbirth and related medical conditions, lactation, and reproductive health decisions), sexual orientation, gender, gender identity or expression, transgender status, gender non-conforming status, intersex status, sexual stereotypes, nationality, citizenship status, personal appearance, marital status, family status, family responsibilities, military status, veteran status, mental and physical disability, medical condition, genetic information, genetic characteristics of yourself or a family member, political views and affiliation, unemployment status, protective order status, status as a victim of domestic violence, sexual assault, or stalking, or any other basis prohibited under applicable law.

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