The Bell’s mission is to provide a new kind of local journalism about Glasgow — narrative, thoughtful and full of investigative rigour and insight - and so far, it’s working. In just nine months, more than 8,000 Glaswegians have signed up to read The Bell and we already have more than 600 paying members. In total, our stories have been read by tens of thousands of people and have already been nominated for the Scottish Press Awards in our first year of operation.
Now, we’re looking for a full-time editor to steer The Bell through the next stage of its journey. Your job will be to commission and edit gripping, intriguing and exclusive stories that get the whole city talking and to manage our small team of talented staff writers and regular freelance contributors. You will be working closely with the senior editors at Mill Media, who have a track record of publishing award-winning journalism.
Role details
- Location: Glasgow (we need someone who lives full-time in the city)
- Salary: £35k-£37k, dependant on experience (and the possibility of getting Mill Media share options in future)
- Basis: Full-time (including some out-of-hours work). Bank holidays plus 28 days holiday per year (plus Christmas Eve, when it falls on a weekday).
- Office/remote: Three days per week in our office/co-work, otherwise remote
- Start date: July 2025
- Application deadline: Saturday 31st May 2025. Scroll down for details on how to apply.
About us
By taking on this job, you will be joining Mill Media, a pioneering company founded in June 2020. So far, our success has been based on a simple idea: giving journalists the time they need to produce great stories.
In the past few years, this approach has turned Mill Media into a new force in British journalism, described as “One of the most interesting and impressive media startups of the last decade,” by the FT’s John Burn-Murdoch, and as “very, very impressive” by the Wall Street Journal’s Emma Tucker. We have received investment from the likes of Mark Thompson, who has led the New York Times and CNN.
Our team of reporters and editors publish high-quality local journalism across the UK, and two of our investigations were long listed by Private Eye for this year’s prestigious Paul Foot Award.
What we’re looking for
The role will be critical to the running of The Bell, but the editor will also be a senior figure within Mill Media, working with our team of editors. Applicants must have at least five years of experience in professional journalism and at least two years experience as an editor.
We need someone who loves coming up with original story ideas and who knows that features journalism requires more creativity when it comes to angles and headlines than conventional news editing. You will be brilliant at finding the best angle for a story, transforming a topic that could be beige in lesser hands into something unforgettable. Strong knowledge of American magazine journalism and viral online essays is not obligatory, but it would help.
“I love the ambition of bringing deeply-reported narrative journalism to local news and I’m so impressed with how it’s going. That’s the kind of journalism Britain needs more of. If I was a young writer right now, I would want to work for Mill Media.”
Tina Brown, former editor of Vanity Fair and the New Yorker.
The right candidate will have the kind of energy and enthusiasm required to power a new title and motivate a team, as well as the experience in commissioning and copy editing to publish high quality stories on a regular basis. They will also be someone with broad interests and who reads widely, allowing them to oversee coverage of social housing and dating trends in the same workday.
Key responsibilities
- Generating lots of Mill Media-style story ideas — ranging from culture to crime, food to local politics. Coming up with the right ideas is the hardest bit of this job, and we really need someone who can do that brilliantly from day one.
- Commissioning a handful of stories per week from staff and freelance writers, and then overseeing the stories as they develop.
- Editing around four stories per week, often going back and forth with writers for several rounds of edits. You will also edit and contribute to our Monday Briefings.
- Managing our Glasgow team, currently two staff writers but set to expand in future, so that they are able to thrive.
- Playing a part in the wider success of the company by taking on edits from other cities when needed, contributing to our strategic decisions etc.
- Occasionally writing your own stories when there are gaps in the editing work.
Working pattern: This is a full-time role. You will work three days a week at our office/co-working space in Glasgow and remotely the rest of the time. You will make regular visits to the company’s head office in Manchester (paid for by the company).
Attributes required
- Superb commissioning: Someone who knows how to spot our kind of story, knows how to develop an original angle and understands the importance of editorial mix - balancing the high with the low; the serious with the fun.
- Great editing: The ability to shepherd good stories to becoming great via brilliant copy work, working with writers on drafts and giving stories structure and narrative flow. Great understanding of what makes a
- Inspired management: The type of person who knows how to work with journalists to give them a sense of purpose and fulfilment while also developing their skills. Emotional intelligence and empathy are critical here.
- Growth mindset: Someone with an entrepreneurial spirit who is motivated by our growth as well as our journalism and will enjoy growing our social media accounts and spreading our brand.
- Mill Media values: Someone who is committed to our key editorial values: accuracy, nuance, thoughtfulness, fairness to sources and giving readers the context they need to understand what is going on.
https://twitter.com/molssimp/status/1817490734469009557
How to apply
To apply for this role, email hiring@millmediaco.uk by Saturday 31st May at the latest, with a brief explanation (in the body of the email) about why you are interested in working with us and why you think you might be a good fit for this role. Please put 'Bell editor' in the subject line.
- Please also include a few links to great stories you have worked on and briefly tell us what your role was.
- List three Glasgow story ideas you would like to work on if you joined us and why you find them interesting.
- Attach your CV or link to your LinkedIn.
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