Digital Editor - Editorial and Culture Lead

Homegrown; Mumbai; On-site; INR 2,500,000 - 4,000,000; Full time

Job summary

Homegrown in Mumbai is seeking an editorial leader with a pulse on contemporary culture and a strong entrepreneurial drive. You will shape editorial strategy, guide writers, and expand Homegrown across editorial, social, video, and IP formats.

You will work closely with senior editors to define growth, build audiences, and develop original cultural IPs while maintaining rigorous standards and credibility.

Qualifications

• 6-9+ years of editorial leadership experience.
• Strong editorial rigour with ability to guide writers.
• Ability to work beyond a website across editorial, social, video, and IPs.
• Comfort with long-form features and social-first formats; can contextualise and publish quickly.
• Understanding of AI, search and changing platform behaviours shaping audience discovery.
• Ability to build and maintain a strong commissioning pipeline across writers, photographers, filmmakers and contributors.

Responsibilities

• Lead day-to-day editorial output across culture, food and travel, music, art, design, identity and contemporary life.
• Edit and shape original features, interviews, reportage, profiles and cultural commentary.
• Manage and mentor the editorial team, helping writers develop stronger voices and perspectives.
• Maintain Homegrown's editorial voice, rigour, credibility and point of view.
• Build a strong commissioning pipeline across writers, photographers, filmmakers and contributors.
• Stay connected to emerging Indian and South Asian culture and movements before they become mainstream.
• Identify larger cultural conversations and strategic features Homegrown should participate in.
• Build networks of voices across India and South Asia.
• Bring editorial taste and cultural curiosity to daily coverage and long-term planning.
• Think strategically about social-first formats and audience growth beyond website traffic.

Skills

Editorial leadership

Mentoring writers

Cross-platform storytelling

Editorial strategy

AI/search literacy

Commissioning pipeline

Job description

Job Summary

What is the role: We are looking for an editorial leader with the combination of editorial authority on the pulse of contemporary culture, digital instinct and strategic thinking. Beyond experience, we are looking for an individual with a strong entrepreneurial spirit, who is driven to build, experiment and help shape what the next chapter of Homegrown media can become.

You understand that a cultural newsroom requires speed and instinct. You know when a story needs deeper editorial rigour, but also when a cultural moment needs to be contextualised and published quickly. You are comfortable making calls, responding to culture in real time and creating an editorial environment that can move with the pace of the world it covers.

Strong editorial rigour and the ability to guide writers are fundamental, but we are looking for someone who thinks beyond the website and understands how a contemporary cultural publication needs to live across editorial, social, video, visual storytelling, community and original cultural IPs. This is not a traditional publication-desk role.

As AI, search and changing discovery behaviours reshape how audiences find and consume media, this role will help define what makes Homegrown valuable. From original perspectives, trusted curation, cultural access, distinctive voices, community and formats audiences actively seek out.

You should be as comfortable shaping a long-form feature as identifying an emerging cultural movement, developing a social-first format, interpreting audience behaviour or asking what the next cultural conversation Homegrown should own is.

The role entails working closely with the Editor-in-Chief and Content Digital Strategy Lead; you will help define Homegrown's editorial agenda and its next phase of growth.

Location: Mumbai (On-site) - Experience: 6-9+ years.

Your key responsibilities

• Lead Homegrown's day-to-day editorial output across culture, food and travel, music, art, design, identity and contemporary life.
• Edit and shape original features, interviews, reportage, profiles and cultural commentary.
• Manage and mentor the editorial team, helping writers develop stronger voices, perspectives and cultural instincts.
• Maintain Homegrown's editorial voice, rigour, credibility and point of view.
• Build a strong commissioning pipeline across writers, photographers, filmmakers and contributors.
• Stay deeply plugged into emerging Indian and South Asian culture: from the people, their spaces, communities, ideas and movements worth paying attention to before they become mainstream.
• Identify the larger cultural conversations and strategic features Homegrown should participate in and those we should begin ourselves.
• Build and nurture a network of emerging and established voices across India and the wider South Asian cultural landscape.
• Bring strong editorial taste and cultural curiosity to both daily coverage and longer-term planning.
• Understand the distinction between something that is simply trending and something that has deeper cultural significance.
• Social-first editorial strategy: Think beyond; social is to be treated as an editorial platform in its own right, not just a distribution channel.
• Editorial strategy and audience growth: To help shape Homegrown's editorial strategy as AI, search and platform behaviours change how contemporary culture is discovered and consumed.
• Think strategically about how Homegrown builds audiences beyond traditional website traffic; across social, video, newsletters, community, direct audiences and emerging platforms.
• Use audience insights, platform behaviour and cultural signals to inform what we commission, how we package it and where it lives.
• Work closely with the Content Digital Strategy Lead to understand what is growing, what audiences return for and where new opportunities are emerging.
• Identify what Homegrown can uniquely create that cannot easily be replicated by aggregated or AI-generated content: original reporting, access, perspective, cultural discovery, talent, community and distinctive formats.
• Help define what an influential cultural media company should look like over the next five years.
• To build recurring editorial formats and cultural IPs: Work with the Editor-in-Chief and Content Digital Strategy Lead to develop ownable Homegrown editorial franchises and cultural IPs.
• Turn cultural insights into recurring formats, talent franchises, special editions, lists, reports, video properties and larger editorial moments.
• Identify ideas that can move beyond one-off stories and become recognisable Homegrown properties.

Your requirements

• Experience: 6-9+ years.
• Strong editorial rigour and the ability to guide writers.
• Ability to think beyond a website and work across editorial, social, video, visual storytelling, community and original cultural IPs.
• Comfort with long-form features and social-first formats; ability to contextualise and publish quickly.
• Understanding of AI, search and changing platform behaviours shaping audience discovery.
• Ability to build and maintain a strong commissioning pipeline across writers, photographers, filmmakers and contributors.