Deputy Editor, Future Perfect
Vox Media
Vox Media employees thrive on innovation and change while ambitiously seeking to master their subject areas, hone their craft, and improve their communities. We help smart, talented, creative professionals make a meaningful impact in media, technology, and the world around them.
Our Future Perfect section is an especially exciting place for that mission to come alive. Future Perfect covers the world through a particular prism: What are the best ways to do good in this world? Future Perfect strives to shine a light on neglected stories that have, or will have, a profound impact on the lives of billions of humans and animals.
Vox is looking for a Deputy Editor for Future Perfect. This role is first and foremost a people-and-story job: you’ll be responsible for managing and editing Future Perfect’s three reporting fellows, helping them generate strong ideas, select the right stories, execute ambitious reporting, and publish clean, sharp copy on a consistent cadence. Because the fellows are relatively early career, this role also includes meaningful coaching and skills development, including planning occasional “brown bag” training sessions.
In addition, the deputy editor will oversee and edit Future Perfect’s twice-weekly newsletter, and, in close partnership with the editor of Future Perfect, will lead the process of recruiting and selecting the next class of fellows who will start in the summer.
The position will be a full-time, 16 month role.
Among our key subject areas include:
- Emerging technology and artificial intelligence
- Philanthropy, altruism, and the institutions that shape giving
- Global health and global development
- Animal welfare and factory farming
- Catastrophic risks to humanity, including pandemics and nuclear war
- Other evidence-driven approaches to improving lives at scale
WHAT YOU'LL DO
- Manage and edit three reporting fellows — soliciting and shaping ideas, selecting stories, guiding reporting plans, editing drafts, and supporting fellows’ growth as journalists at Vox. This includes helping fellows build strong habits around sourcing, structure, evidence, fairness, and voice, while also meeting publishing goals.
- Provide journalism training and coaching for early-career reporters, including designing occasional brown-bag sessions (e.g., story framing, interviewing, working with studies/data, reporting ethics, writing with clarity and voice, and navigating edits).
- Oversee the recruitment and selection of the next class of three reporting fellows, beginning in the spring. This includes outreach to potential candidates, managing and winnowing applications, designing and evaluating edit tests, coordinating interview loops, and helping make final selections in conjunction with the editor of Future Perfect.
- Oversee and edit Future Perfect’s twice-weekly newsletter, including shaping lineups, editing copy, sharpening voice and structure, and ensuring the newsletter reliably reflects the best of Future Perfect’s mission and journalism.
- Support day-to-day editorial operations as needed: helping maintain story calendars, identifying gaps and opportunities in coverage, coordinating with partners across Vox (copy desk, art, audience, audio/video), and stepping in on additional editing and management duties to keep the section running smoothly.
WHAT YOU'LL BRING
- At least 3 years of full-time editing experience, ideally in a fast-paced digital newsroom environment; management experience is a major plus.
- A clear point of view on how to coach and develop writers, especially early-career reporters, with a willingness to give direct feedback while building trust and momentum.
- Strong story judgment and editing range — you can help reporters move from a promising question to a clean nut graf, from a messy draft to a coherent structure, and from “interesting” to “compelling and useful.”
- Comfort with the realities of web publishing: you understand urgency and speed, without sacrificing accuracy and care.
- Enthusiasm for (and ideally familiarity with) Future Perfect’s core areas — emerging technology and AI, philanthropy, global health, global development, and animal welfare — and a genuine appetite for evidence-driven reporting and argument.
- An organized, self-starting approach: you can manage multiple moving parts (fellows, edits, training, recruitment, newsletters) without dropping the thread.
WHERE YOU’LL WORK
This job is based in DC or NYC.
WHY VOX MEDIA?
WHAT WE OFFER
This is a permanent, full-time position. This job is benefits-eligible. We pride ourselves in providing comprehensive benefits to support all of our employees wherever they are in life. You can find more information about our benefits here.
OUR DEI+ COMMITMENT
Vox Media is committed to building an inclusive environment where everyone can show up as their authentic selves and create their best work. We recognize that great stories, platforms, products and services come from people with all manner of backgrounds and experiences. We recognize that our commitments require ongoing work and sustained attention, as well as adaptation to new insights and best practices. We keep our diversity data public for the sake of accountability, transparency and communication. Learn more about our values here, and our approach to corporate citizenship here.
Vox Media is an Equal Opportunity Employer and qualified applicants will receive consideration without regard to race, color, gender, sexual orientation, gender identity or expression, religion, disability, national origin, protected veteran status, age, or any other status protected by applicable national, federal, state, or local law. Vox Media will also consider all qualified applicants with criminal histories in accordance with applicable Fair Chance laws. We are also committed to providing reasonable accommodations as part of the application process to candidates with disabilities. If you require a reasonable accommodation as part of the application process, please contact our People & Culture team (recruitment@voxmedia.com).
WHAT COMES NEXT
Our recruiting team will go through applications in a timely manner. Please note that our recruiting team will only contact you from @voxmedia.com email addresses, never via text message. Read more about how our recruiting team operates, and how to protect yourself from recruitment fraud, here.
PAY TRANSPARENCY
The salary range listed below represents the minimum and maximum base pay for this position at the time of this posting. Final salary offered to the candidate selected for the position will be based on factors including but not limited to the candidate's skills and experience.