Managing Editor, Community + Platforms

WBEZ Chicago; Chicago (IL); On-site; USD 145,000 - 160,000; Full time

Benefits offered by this job

Medical insurance

Dental insurance

Vision insurance

Vacation and holidays

Life insurance

Disability coverage

Retirement savings plan

Commuter benefits

Job summary

Chicago Public Media seeks a Managing Editor, Community + Platforms to lead community engagement, audience growth, and multiplatform publishing strategy. This senior leader will oversee Audience, Engaged Journalism, and Platforms teams, aligning insights with editorial decisions and modernizing workflows.

You will collaborate with newsroom, product, membership, and analytics teams to ensure journalism reaches diverse audiences across digital, print, and emerging platforms.

Qualifications

• Demonstrated leadership in audience strategy and community engagement.
• Experience guiding multiplatform editorial development and distribution.
• Proven ability to use data to guide strategy and decisions.
• Strong leadership, communication, and change management skills.
• Commitment to public service journalism and inclusive storytelling.

Responsibilities

• Develop and lead a unified editorial strategy focused on community growth and multiplatform publishing.
• Oversee Audience, Engaged Journalism, and Platforms teams with cross-functional collaboration.
• Lead editorial strategy across newsletters, social, and new formats.
• Use analytics and community feedback to inform priorities and planning.
• Establish efficient workflows and standards to support audience-first publishing.
• Partner with newsroom leadership to shape platform coverage and priorities.
• Drive platform innovation and investments in emerging opportunities.
• Build and mentor a high-performing leadership team and culture of accountability.
• Identify operational efficiencies to support long-term sustainability.

Skills

Leadership

Audience Strategy

Editorial Judgment

Cross-Functional Leadership

Change Management

Audience Growth

Education

Bachelor's degree in journalism

Advanced degree preferred

Job description

About Chicago Public Media

Chicago Public Media is one of the nation’s largest local nonprofit news organizations. Home to WBEZ 91.5FM, the Chicago Sun-Times, and Vocalo. Chicago Public Media reaches more than 3.3 million people weekly across broadcast, print, and digital platforms. As a mission-driven organization, we aspire to be the most trusted news source Chicagoans turn to for understanding the people, events, and ideas shaping our community.

Chicago Public Media is a 100% community-funded newsroom powered by nearly 97,000 members whose support makes our journalism possible. This sustained community investment helped drive nationally recognized work in 2025, including 29 awards from esteemed organizations, including the Public Media Journalists Association, the Edward R. Murrow Awards, and the National Association of Black Journalists.

We believe independent journalism is essential to a healthy democracy and that access to objective, fact-based news is a right for every citizen. We serve the public interest by creating diverse content that informs and enriches our community, supported by a dedicated staff of approximately 250 professionals.

For more information, please see the Chicago Public Media Annual Report.

Position Summary

Chicago Public Media is seeking a Managing Editor, Community + Platforms to lead the newsroom's community engagement, audience growth, and multiplatform publishing strategy. This senior newsroom leader will oversee the teams responsible for connecting our journalism with audiences across digital, social, newsletters, community engagement, video, photography, print, and emerging platforms.

As a member of the newsroom leadership team, you will develop a community-first editorial strategy that strengthens how journalism is produced, distributed, and experienced by our audiences across every platform. You will lead efforts to align community and audience insights with editorial decision-making, modernize newsroom workflows, and ensure our investments in platforms and storytelling formats reflect changing audience behaviors.

The Managing Editor, Community + Platforms will oversee the Audience, Engaged Journalism, and Platforms teams, building a collaborative structure that brings together platform innovation, visual story-telling, audience development, community engagement and print production. This leader will partner closely with the newsroom, product, technology, membership, and marketing/data analytics teams to ensure Chicago Public Media's journalism reaches and serves audiences wherever they are.

Key Responsibilities

• Develop and lead a unified editorial strategy that centers community and audience growth, community engagement, and multiplatform publishing across Chicago Public Media.
• Oversee the newsroom's Audience, Engaged Journalism, and Platforms teams, ensuring strong collaboration across editorial, product, technology, membership, and marketing.
• Lead editorial strategy across newsletters, social media, audience engagement, community initiatives, print production, photography, video, interactive storytelling, and emerging platforms.
• Use audience insights, analytics, and community feedback to inform editorial priorities, distribution strategies, and newsroom planning.
• Establish workflows and editorial standards that support efficient, audience-first publishing across all platforms while improving collaboration between teams.
• Partner with newsroom leadership to shape platform coverage strategies for breaking news, enterprise reporting, special projects, and organizational priorities.
• Lead platform innovation initiatives, including new storytelling formats, workflow improvements, and investments in emerging audience opportunities.
• Build and mentor a high-performing leadership team while fostering a culture of experimentation, collaboration, accountability, and continuous improvement.
• Work with newsroom leaders to identify operational efficiencies, optimize platform investments, and support long-term organizational sustainability.

Minimum Qualifications

• Significant leadership responsibilities in audience strategy, community engagement, newsroom editorial, and/or multiplatform publishing.
• Demonstrated success leading audience growth, community engagement, or platform strategy in a complex editorial organization.
• Experience managing multidisciplinary teams across audience, engagement, digital publishing, visual journalism, or newsroom operations.
• Strong editorial judgment with a deep understanding of audience behavior, digital publishing, and evolving media platforms.
• Experience using audience research, analytics, and performance data to guide editorial strategy and organizational decision-making.
• Proven ability to lead organizational change, build collaborative workflows, and manage cross-functional initiatives.
• Experience balancing daily news operations with long-term strategic planning and innovation.
• Exceptional leadership, communication, and change management skills.
• Commitment to public service journalism, inclusive storytelling, collaboration, and serving diverse communities.

Education

Bachelor's degree in journalism, communications, digital media, public affairs, or a related field preferred; advanced degree also preferred.

Compensation

The expected pay range for this position is $145,000 - $160,000 per ANNUM.

Chicago Public Media provides pay ranges representing its good faith estimate of what the organization reasonably expects to pay for a position. The pay offered to a selected candidate will be determined based on factors such as (but not limited to the scope and responsibilities of the position, the qualifications of the selected candidate, departmental budget availability, internal equity, geographical location, and external market pay for comparable jobs.

Working at Chicago Public Media

At Chicago Public Media, we care deeply about our employees as we know attracting, developing, and growing talent is key to our success and enhancing our impact.

Our culture is one where collaboration, diversity of ideas, and innovation are encouraged. We value colleagues who will enhance our culture by bringing new ideas, divergent experiences, and talents to our dynamic workplace.

At Chicago Public Media we believe dedication to a great workplace includes supporting our employees and their families. As a result, we provide a broad and generous benefits package for employees at hire and in the years to come.

Our benefits include

• a competitive salary and benefits package which includes medical, dental, vision, vacation, holidays, life insurance, disability coverage, retirement savings, and a commuter benefits plan.

Chicago Public Media is an Equal Opportunity Employer

and we actively seek and welcome people from all backgrounds, orientations, and life experiences to join our team.

The essential functions described above are not all-inclusive and are not intended to create any contractual or other legal commitment. Chicago Public Media may change the content or format of this job at any time in its sole and exclusive discretion without notice.