Assistant Editor – Arabic Forensics – BBC (London)

Package Description

Job title: Assistant Editor – Arabic Forensics

Job reference: 19288

Band: E

Contract type: Permanent/Continuing

Location: Office base is NBH, London

Final day to apply: 11:59pm (BST) Wednesday 4th of December 2024

Salary: £51,700 – £66,350 per annum depending on relevant skills, knowledge and experience. The expected salary range for this role reflects internal benchmarking and external market insights.

Recruiter: Ruman Dhillon

We’re happy to discuss flexible working. Please indicate your choice under the flexible working question in the application. There is no obligation to raise this at the application stage but if you wish to do so, you are welcome to. Flexible working will be part of the discussion at offer stage.

Excellent career progression – the BBC offers great opportunities for employees to seek new challenges and work in different areas of the organisation.
Unrivalled training and development opportunities – our in-house Academy hosts a wide range of internal and external courses and certification.
Benefits – We offer a negotiable salary package, a flexible 35-hour working week for work-life balance and 25 days annual leave with the option to buy an extra 5 days, a defined pension scheme and discounted dental, health care and gym. You can find out more about working at the BBC by selecting this link to our candidate pack.

If you need to discuss adjustments or access requirements for the interview process please contact the [email protected].  For any general queries, please contact: [email protected].

Freelancers are eligible to apply for an internal role if they are on a Worker Contract and they have worked continuously for 6 months. If they have worked for less than 6 months continuously or have a break of 3 weeks or more between engagements, they must seek Divisional HR approval to apply for an internal role prior to submitting an application.

If they are unsure which contract they are on, they can speak to their booker or the HR BP, however if it helps – both a PAYE freelance or Modus Gross contract is considered a Worker contract and covered by the Worker terms found here.

Job Introduction

The BBC World Service has been undergoing a transformation to ensure that the best World Service content travels further and makes greater impact.  As such we have refocused our strategy to build reach and engagement on owned and operated platforms, including TV, and on digital.  We have also been changing the way that we operate.
World Service Languages Channels brings together our TV and streaming offers. At the core of this are BBC Arabic and BBC Persian, which together have a weekly audience of over 42 million, some of the largest BBC global audiences.

As part of our commitment to clarity and truth, and in alignment with the missions of BBC News and BBC World Service,we aim to enhance transparency  in our stor telling . Our goal is to establish BBC Arabic and BBC Persian as world leaders in transparent journalism.  Therefore, we have built on the strong verification skills in both channels and created specialist teams in OSINT skills to expand and enhance our capabilities. The teams are embedded within the channels, helping to cultivate these abilities more broadly. The focus is on responding to breaking stories within the first 48 hours and contributing to more in-depth work when commissioned with other teams. The roles have involved regular live presentations and writing for digital requiring first-class proficiency in both Arabic and English for the Arabic output.

They will provide  quick turnaround verification on regional stories using standardised BBC systems and tools, fact-check during breaking news and major events, and play  a key part in the daily output of BBC Arabic and BBC Persian.

Though their primary role will be to present on WSL Channels, these forensics experts will work closely with colleagues in BBC Verify and BBC WSL Longform, operating jointly and coordinating daily. They will regularly reversion rest of the world content from BBC Verify and will contribute to BBC Verify’s coverage of the Arab world and Iran.
They will also contribute to planned weekly programming on BBC Arabic and BBC Persian, lifting the curtain on BBC investigative and forensics work from across BBC World Service and BBC News.

We are looking for an experienced and inspiring Assistant Editor to lead our transparency journalism.

Reporting to the Senior News Editor, Evolution and Streaming, the successful candidate will help shape and implement our strategy for making our forensics journalism more impactful and will lead on promoting best practices of transparency journalism across Languages Channels.

Main Responsibilities

• To lead and guide our journalists and reporters to produce impactful, engaging, inspiring investigative content based on robust research
• To provide rigorous supervision to ensure all of our of journalism is produced in line with BBC editorial, legal, high risk and information security guidelines
• To set up rigorous production workflows and templates, from data mining and verification to commissioning of visual assets and creating impact on social media
• To inspire and champion journalists and reporters in creating explainers that shed light on transparency journalism and how we do what we do
• To exploit recent technical innovations and available BBC resources and studios to make our visual storytelling more appealing to the younger underserved audience
• To establish an efficient channel of pitching and commissioning stories between the forensics unit and other Arabic and Persian teams
• To lead risk management and compliance, such as exposure of team members to traumatizing content and high risk deployments, and collaborate with relevant BBC teams to provide mitigations
• To help other Channels editors skill up their teams in areas of forensics and transparency journalism
• To utilize the full potential of the WSL Output department to have agile transfer of staff and skills for editorial projects and in response to major news events
• To collaborate with WSL Disinformation, BBC Verify and other teams with similar objectives
• To liaise with Newsgathering and Deployment Editors to make sure deployments and commissioning are carried out in the most organized and cost-effective way, identifying synergies, avoiding duplication
• To liaise with Planning and Prospects Editor to make sure our content is shared most efficiently across all 42 languages and its impact is amplified as much as possible
• To champion and optimize the forensics team’s output with relevant service editors, and be able to work collaboratively with other teams across BBC News
• To ensure all content reflects our diverse audiences
• To support and deputize, when necessary, the Senior News Editor, Evolution and Streaming across a range of editorial and management responsibilities
• To attend (and chair when necessary) daily, weekly and monthly meetings
• To champion sustainability in content production

Are you the Right Candidate?

• Strong leadership skills with a proven ability to inspire, motivate, and guide a diverse team towards achieving high standards of performance and innovation. This includes fostering a collaborative and inclusive work environment, providing clear direction, and supporting professional development to ensure the team remains engaged and productive.
• Strong, demonstrable track record of commissioning and producing/leading original stories that have created impact across multiple Language Services and other BBC outlets.
• Proven track record of using and leading the use of OSINT and other forensic tools and techniques and data-driven research to produce news-making content
• Strong evidence of managing an editorial team
• Substantial experience of editorial innovation and proven editorial judgement
• Experience of developing innovative solutions to storytelling challenges – such as heavy data stories, untold stories and difficult analysis – to aid audience understanding.
• Understanding demographic challenges and potential solutions to deliver key content to audiences of need
• Fluency in written and spoken Arabic language and deep knowledge of Arabic-speaking media landscape
• Demonstrable experience in managing, directing and motivating staff – including remotely – in challenging and high pressured environments
• Thorough understanding of audience needs and TV and digital media landscape
• Deep understanding of data analytics tools and search optimisation
• Strong negotiation and stakeholder management skills