Culture & Life Editor

Job Description

Job Description

Summary of Position

Newsday is seeking an ambitious, audience-focused Culture & Life Editor to lead a team of talented journalists.

We are reimagining how we cover life on Long Island, building a modern, digital-first report focused on the issues, experiences and conversations that shape how people live. We are looking for an assistant managing editor who understands that culture is all-encompassing — it’s about affordability, identity, family, community, work, food, faith, lifestyle and the forces changing life on Long Island. This editor understands that today's audiences connect through video, social platforms, visual storytelling, newsletters and live experiences.

The Culture & Life Editor will lead a team of reporters, editors and contributors producing journalism that is urgent, useful, distinctive, visually compelling and deeply local. This leader will oversee storytelling across Newsday’s platforms and emerging digital formats, creating coverage that builds audience habit, drives subscriber engagement and delivers journalism people can't find anywhere else.

The successful candidate will help shape one of Newsday's most important growth areas. This editor believes local journalism should do more than report what happened but also help readers understand what it means to live on Long Island.

What You'll Lead

You'll oversee coverage that helps readers navigate, understand and enjoy life on Long Island, blending service journalism, enterprise reporting, audience insights, cultural storytelling and accountability journalism.

Coverage areas include:

• Affordability and quality of life
• Food, dining and local experiences
• Entertainment and things to do
• Family life and generational change
• Long Island identity and culture
• Community trends and social shifts
• Consumer and service journalism
• Home and lifestyle
• Faith, traditions and celebrations
• Emerging cultural conversations

Essential Duties & Function

• Lead daily and long-range planning for Culture & Life coverage.
• Develop enterprise stories, recurring franchises, newsletters and audience-focused products.
• Identify emerging conversations, trends and cultural shifts before competitors.
• Use audience insights, analytics and newsroom metrics to inform editorial priorities.
• Partner across the newsroom, including audience, visuals, product and video to produce compelling digital journalism.
• Elevate service journalism that helps readers navigate everyday life on Long Island.
• Develop distinctive local reporting that cannot be found elsewhere.
• Coach reporters to strengthen sourcing, storytelling, digital skills and audience engagement.
• Ensure coverage reflects the diversity, complexity and evolving demographics of Long Island.
• Collaborate with audience and product teams on subscriber growth and retention strategies.
• Build editorial plans around major seasonal, cultural and community moments.

Essential Job Knowledge & Skills

The successful candidate will have:

• Significant editing and newsroom leadership experience in a digital-first environment.
• A strong understanding of audience behavior, digital storytelling and subscriber-focused journalism.
• Experience leading enterprise, service and culture coverage.
• Exceptional news judgment and storytelling instincts.
• Strong collaboration and communication skills across departments and platforms.
• A deep curiosity about how people live and the issues that matter most to local communities.

Physical requirements

This position is hybrid with a three-day-per-week, in-office requirement.

 

Compensation

The salary range for this role $155,000 - 165,000, commensurate with experience.

Newsday Media Group is an equal opportunity employer. Applicants and incumbents are selected, placed, trained, compensated and promoted without regard to race, color, religion, sex, national origin, age, marital or veteran status, or disability or other classifications protected by applicable law. In addition, Newsday Media Group provides a reasonable accommodation for applicants/incumbents with disabilities. Please advise Human Resources if you require a reasonable accommodation.