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Director of Product and Platforms

Cityside Journalism Initiative, a pioneering nonprofit organization devoted to building community and strengthening democracy through local news, seeks a creative and hands-on Director of Product and Platforms.

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Launched in 2020, Cityside is home to two widely read, award-winning local news sites in the San Francisco Bay Area: Berkeleyside, now in its 14th year, and The Oaklandside, which launched in 2020. We plan to launch a third news outlet, Richmondside, in 2024.

This role combines product leadership with direct ownership of our existing publishing platforms. It’s an opportunity for an ambitious and well-organized product manager to have an outsize impact on our growth, our journalism, and our mission. You’ll report to Cityside’s Chief of Strategy and serve as a member of our leadership team. The salary range for this position is $120,000 to $140,000.

You’ll work on an exciting mix of projects impacting both our journalism and our business and operations. For example, you might:

  • Collaborate with reporters and editors to plan a compelling design for a new investigative journalism package
  • Reimagine how we roll out our annual Wildfire Guide, better helping East Bay residents prepare without getting overwhelmed
  • Evaluate how people donate to our journalism to make online giving easier
  • Redesign our media kit to help local businesses understand how advertising at Cityside news site could help them
  • Design a thoughtful new way for readers to share feedback with our journalists

You’ll collaborate on projects like these with a stellar group of journalists and specialists in nonprofit fundraising, advertising, events, and people operations. And most importantly, you’ll be empowered to set the priorities for a product and platform roadmap across our organization.

What you’ll do

  • Work with the Chief Strategy Officer to develop and maintain a roadmap for all editorial and business/operations product needs
  • Own the planning, development, and long-term support of the products and platforms we create and use
  • Recruit and manage contractors to support Cityside’s current and future products, in particular, our CMS
  • Research and plan for products to fill new editorial and business needs. Be the primary voice when choosing vendors or making build-versus-buy decisions
  • Solicit input from Cityside staff, leadership, and, when appropriate, readers, to make smart product decisions
  • Be the first responder to product and platform questions from staff, guiding them to resources and troubleshooting problems as they arise
  • Act as the primary liaison between Cityside and vendors that provide products and platforms we rely on
  • Design systems and workflows to ensure our platforms are easy and convenient to use
  • Manage the implementation and ongoing adoption of the Cityside Wiki
  • Be obsessively focused on our mission and constantly vigilant that we’re making the correct product investments to ensure our long-term success

Required qualifications

  • Experience building and refining products for both internal and public users
  • Experience leading cross-functional teams to complete complex projects
  • Knowledge of the tools and workflows used for digital publishing
  • Respect for colleagues with different skills and a knack for getting great work out of folks whose expertise is different from your own
  • Strong conversational understanding of the technologies used to build modern web products
  • A rigorous system for organizing yourself and the projects you lead
  • The ability to ask hard questions, articulate complicated tradeoffs, and drive stakeholders toward consensus
  • Enthusiasm for the ongoing stewardship and support of products after they are shipped
  • Must be authorized to work in the United States
  • Must be able to commute to the East Bay

We’re especially interested in candidates who…

  • Have prior experience with our primary publishing platform, Newspack, or with WordPress more generally
  • Have experience working in journalism or digital media
  • Have experience as a web developer or designer
  • Have developed new products using a user-centric approach
  • Have previously hired and managed contractors for project development and support
  • Are comfortable working in an organization where they will be the only professional product employee for the foreseeable future—and eager to collaborate with colleagues across our company who are equally obsessed with best practices in product and editorial design

What we offer

  • $1,000 a year in professional development stipends
  • Medical, dental, and vision coverage
  • 401(k) retirement plan with a 4% company match
  • 20 paid personal days
  • 12 paid sick days
  • 13 paid holidays
  • 5 additional paid days for an end-of-the-year break between Christmas Day and New Year
  • Parental and caregiver leave of up to six months
  • Life insurance coverage

Cityside is an equal opportunity employer committed to building a diverse organization that is safe and inclusive for all employees. We recognize that people of color, gender-expansive people, the LGBTQ+ community, and people from working-class backgrounds have been marginalized in journalism organizations. We believe that these communities must be centered in the work that we do, so we strongly encourage applicants from these identities to apply, even if they don’t reflect all of these qualifications.