Apply to be the Bureau’s new Data Lab Director

The Bureau of Investigative Journalism is launching an ambitious journalism project aimed at providing data-led stories to local journalists.

We are recruiting a director to lead this new project, who will build a four-person team and over the three year grant period deliver the project’s mission: to increase the number of public interest stories, underpinned by data and technology, that are published by local journalists.

The Local Data Lab is a collaborative project working with a network of local journalists and bloggers to identify data that could provide local stories. It is expected that analysis of national-scale datasets by the Lab team will help supply local leads that will be developed by members of the network.

The project has been funded thanks to the Google Digital News Initiative.

We are looking for an ambitious and entrepreneurial-minded candidate who has a strong understanding of how technology and data-led analysis can produce stories.

This is an exciting opportunity for the right candidate to build an innovative, high-profile team working in the emerging data journalism sector.

Responsibilities:

• Owning the goals and objectives of the Local Data Lab, especially those relating to increasing the number of public interest stories published in the local press
• Ensuring that the team meets the milestones from our primary funder, Google
• Ensuring that the team’s work meets the needs of local journalists, and that those needs are well understood
• Building and managing a team to deliver on our goals and objectives
• Reporting on progress to the BIJ’s management
• Contributing towards fundraising efforts.

Essential Experience:

The ideal candidate would have been responsible for at least one of the following:

• A team of investigative reporters working on public interest stories, including those that made use of data
• A public interest project within an NGO or a campaign, that made use of data
• A public interest technology project.

Desirable Experience: 

• Managing a membership network
• Working in the local news industry
• Delivering grant-funded projects, including reporting back on successes and failures
• Writing funding bids and proposals
• Working within small startups or other small teams without extensive support infrastructures.

Essential Skills:

• Personnel management, including setting objectives, motivating, reviewing and performance-managing staff
• Project management
• Risk management
• Good interpersonal communication skills
• Understanding of the functioning of government and other significant institutions
• An understanding of when and where computers and data can be useful to creating public accountability, and when they cannot
• Understanding of what makes for a meaningful story
• Some knowledge of budgeting
• Report writing (especially progress reports)
• Ability to double-check and sign-off the work of colleagues
• A good network of contacts in either data journalism or civic tech.

Desirable Skills: 

• Investigative journalism skills
• Knowledge of media law
• Data manipulation skills
• Technology project creation or management
• Familiarity with good practice in data visualisation
• Understanding of video platforms and the advantages of video in any online output.

Salary up to £65,000 per year. 

To apply for the position please send a CV and covering letter to: [email protected]

The deadline is July 18 at 9am. Interviews will take place in London on July 25.