Editorial Director

Description:

The successful candidate will support the Publishing Director and Deputy Publishing Director in managing and developing our publishing, strategy and workflow to launch bestsellers and ensure quality of publishing. You will commission and publish a portion of the list directly, while having insight into the entire publishing programme, acting as an ambassador for the list and contributing to strategy for titles outside your own commissioning. You will help identify and build a case for new projects, negotiate contracts, position and launch books, galvanise colleagues across departments, solicit quotes, write great copy, brief and oversee jacket design, while being a primary point of contact for authors and agents.

Candidate Profile

The following qualities are preferred:

• A proven track record in editing, acquiring, proactively commissioning new ideas and profitably publishing literary non-fiction and fiction. If your experience is in non-fiction only, we would also welcome hearing from you.
• Creativity, energy, sound commercial judgement and editorial flair combined with the ability to follow through and keep on schedule and budget.
• Ability to build strong relationships with authors, agents and across the wider industry.
• A keen sense of Chatto & Windus’s and Vintage’s priorities and values, and what makes for an outstanding work of non-fiction, narrative non-fiction and fiction.
• Comfortable acting as an internal and external ambassador for Chatto & Windus, and as a leader within the imprint and as part of the wider Vintage editorial team.
• A strong team player with interpersonal sensitivity and emotional intelligence.
• Professional curiosity, and an appetite for innovation and problem-solving.
• A good understanding of the marketplace: retailers, media, audiences and competitors.
• Confident partner for Marketing, Publicity, and other internal teams to develop each book’s strategy, positioning, copy and design.
• Proven author care and negotiation experience.