Publishing Platform Manager

Royal Society of Chemistry; Cambridge; Hybrid; GBP 39,000 - 44,000; Full time

Benefits offered by this job

Hybrid working

Job summary

The Royal Society of Chemistry is recruiting a Publishing Platform Manager to oversee the journals platform, ensuring effective operation, development and alignment with publishing strategy. The role offers hybrid working with occasional UK travel and home-working flexibility within the UK.

You will work closely with Product, Technology and publishing staff, managing the roadmap, vendor relationships and platform improvements to enhance content discoverability and production efficiency.

Qualifications

• Experience managing or supporting digital publishing platforms and systems.
• Experience communicating with technology providers and managing external vendors.
• Strong ability to prioritise and manage competing priorities.
• Proven ability to engage with diverse stakeholders to achieve goals.
• Ability to gather requirements from stakeholders and translate for technical teams.
• Willingness to learn new technologies quickly and adapt to changes.
• Understanding of academic publishing editorial and production processes (e.g. metadata).

Responsibilities

• Support the journals platform as it moves into BAU and assist with onboarding new processes.
• Help define the future roadmap for development of the journals platform with Product management and vendors.
• Identify opportunities for improvements to feed into the roadmap.
• Lead delivery of the platform roadmap with vendors and internal teams.
• Improve content discoverability, accessibility and reusability on the platform.
• Maintain knowledge of platform developments and share industry best practices.
• Ensure platform content has clear owners and is well maintained.
• Manage vendor relationships and monitor performance with the Systems Support team.
• Monitor platform performance and user interaction to identify trends and issues.
• Ensure VPAT alignment and accessibility standards for the platform.
• Monitor spend and advise on budget use for the platform.
• Become a trusted admin for the journals platform and provide user guidance.
• Document configuration and provide training to the Systems Support team.

Skills

Platform management

Vendor management

Stakeholder engagement

Roadmap development

Content publishing workflows

Technical problem solving

Job description

Application Closing Date: 9 November 2026 11:59pm

Salary: £38,500 - £44,000

We are seeking a highly motivated publishing professional with a strong understanding of publishing technologies, publishing processes and workflows to manage the operation, optimisation and ongoing development roadmap of our journals publishing platform, supporting delivery of our publishing strategy.

The Publishing Platform Manager role is a full-time permanent position working as part of the systems support team to support our customers and staff in their interactions with our journals platform to develop and support our publishing processes and systems as needed. The role offers an opportunity to develop expertise in platform strategy, roadmap development, requirements management, vendor management and technology-enabled business change, working closely with Silverchair and other technology partners, as well as Product, Technology and operational teams across the RSC to shape future publishing capabilities. At the RSC we embrace flexibility and offer hybrid working, which means our teams come together when they need to collaborate. Although this role is contractually based at our Cambridge office, you will be able to work from home within the UK, with the expectation that you will attend the office as needed for your role.

Key Responsibilities

• Support our new journals platform and related processes as it moves into BAU, liaising with the Publishing department, Product Management team and the product vendor.
• Work with the Systems Manager, Journals and Product Management team to set the future roadmap for development of the journals platform.
• You will identify opportunities and process improvements to feed into the roadmap.
• Lead the delivery of the journals platform roadmap, coordinating and working with vendor and RSC development teams, RSC Product Management and UX teams, and other stakeholders.
• Optimise the value of our journals content delivered to readers through our platform, improving customer satisfaction and making our content more discoverable, accessible and reusable.
• Actively maintain knowledge and understanding of developments in content creation, curation and production, continuously reviewing and sharing good practice and industry standards, to improve the efficiency of the platform.
• Ensure that “supporting content” on the platform is maintained and has appropriate owners.
• Be the primary link between the RSC and the platform vendor and maintain a sound working relationship with the vendor’s team for both incident resolution/bug fixes and development of features via custom development or influencing the vendor roadmap.
• Monitor and manage the performance of the vendor team as necessary.
• Continually monitor website performance, based on our benchmarks and expected improvements, and work with our vendor to identify and rectify issues.
• Monitor user interaction with the platform to identify and report on trends, usability barriers, or opportunities.
• Ensure the platform and our content complies with relevant accessibility standards, creating and maintaining a Voluntary Product Accessibility Template (VPAT) for the platform.
• Monitor platform spend and make recommendations for best use of budget to Systems Manager, Journals and Journals Manager, Publishing Services & Production.
• Become an expert administrator for the journals platform, maintaining smooth day-to-day running of the platform with the assistance of the rest of the Systems Support team.
• Document our platform configuration and provide guidance and training to the Systems Support team to ensure that the platform is adequately supported.
• Act as the internal representative for the platform with the Journals department, Technology and other stakeholders.
• Provide technical support and user training on the platform and investigate user queries (internal and external).
• Assist the Systems Support team in maintaining our upstream peer review and production systems as required, becoming proficient in their use. You will keep abreast of work on the upstream systems and ensure that changes do not negatively affect content on the platform.

Essential Qualifications and Skills

• Demonstrable knowledge and experience of managing or supporting digital platforms and systems
• Experience of working with technology providers or similar suppliers and ability to communicate technical needs and manage external vendor relationships.
• Strong prioritisation skills and demonstrable experience in managing competing priorities
• Proven ability to engage and consult with a wide range of stakeholders to achieve shared goals.
• Ability to gather stakeholders requirements and communicate with technical and non-technical audiences.
• Ability to learn and apply new technologies quickly and effectively
• Highly skilled at problem solving and troubleshooting
• Strong understanding of academic publishing editorial and production processes and standards (e.g. metadata).

Desirable Qualifications and Skills

• Experience in project management, including planning, producing documentation & training materials
• Experience working with publishing systems or agile product teams, particularly in systems testing and quality assurance
• Experience uncovering and validating customer and business requirements and delivering solutions for them

At the RSC, we recognise the benefits of a diverse workforce and welcome applicants from a range of backgrounds to apply.

We particularly encourage applications from disabled and ethnic minority candidates.

As a part of the Disability Confident Scheme, we endeavour, where possible, to offer an interview to candidates meeting the essential criteria of the role, who has a substantial physical/mental impairment which impacts their ability to carry out day‑to‑day tasks.

We are committed to making our recruitment processes accessible to all and as part of this, we are flexible in the ways we give and receive information.

Being part of the Royal Society of Chemistry is to be at the heart of a dedicated, forward‑thinking and passionate collection of people. You’ll find opportunities to work in publishing, membership, sales, marketing, communications, technology and finance, community outreach, and many others. Everything we do, no matter the area, is to support a global scientific community. The groups we work with are exceptionally diverse - from teachers, scientists and academics, librarians and corporates to politicians and the public.

We are a Disability Confident Committed Employer