Extend - Journalist - North East And Cumbria

Package Description

Extend: EX2324

Job Reference: 13351

Band: C

Salary: Up to £38,000 depending on relevant skills, knowledge and experience. The expected salary range for this role reflects internal benchmarking and external market insights.

Contract type: Permanent role – F/T

Location:North East and Cumbria

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, gym and much more.

Job Introduction

This role is advertised as part of our BBC Extend programme for disabled people. To apply for this role you should identify as deaf, disabled or neurodivergent and must meet either: the definition of disability in the Equality Act (2010), or the definition of disability in the Disability Discrimination Act (1995) if applying in Northern Ireland. You’re broadly defined as disabled under both acts if you have a physical or mental impairment that has a substantial and long-term negative or adverse effect on your ability to do normal daily activities. This definition includes both apparent and non-apparent conditions and impairments, and medical conditions such as Cancer, HIV or Multiple Sclerosis.

We are committed to making the process of applying for this role as accessible as possible. If you need to discuss adjustments or access requirements for the application process, or have any questions about our Extend programme, please contact the BBC Extend team via the shared mailbox.
The BBC are fully committed to providing workplace adjustments to help eliminate barriers in the workplace that disabled people face. To do this, we have our own dedicated BBC Access and Disability Service that provides assessments and support throughout employment with us. If you are successful in applying for this role and require workplace adjustments, we will work with you to get your adjustments in place.

If you’d like more information on BBC Extend, please visit the BBC Extend webpage.

The BBC North East & Cumbria digital team produces content which serves both local audiences and national and international audiences via the BBC News website and social media.

We are looking for a motivated, innovative online journalist based in one of our locations across the region - Middlesbrough, Carlisle or Newcastle. This will primarily be a digital writing role with an emphasis on digital-first storytelling online, with multimedia opportunities to expand your storytelling across online, social media, television and radio channels.
We want a driven and passionate journalist who wants to help reach new audiences with the news that matters to them. The role requires someone who will be keen to do more than just look for press releases – we want original ideas that help reflect the diverse audience that lives across the region.

Creative treatments, gaining great access to people at the heart of stories and working collaboratively with a wide range of colleagues are essential.

Main Responsibilities

• Producing and writing news content for the BBC website and social media accounts for the North East & Cumbria and beyond.
• The ability to produce fast, accurate copy when a big story breaks.
• Using the BBC’s production systems – currently CPS and Optimo – to produce stories.
• Understanding how to use images, video and headlines to enhance your copy and make it appealing to our audience.
• Responsible for originating and producing stories for the BBC website which can also be used on other outlets, as well as turning around content from wires and press releases.
• Working with colleagues to ensure all our journalism works across digital, TV and radio platforms.
• Coming up with story and feature ideas which help us represent the many different sides of life in the region.
• To tailor different news treatments for different audiences ensuring that the output reflects the audiences we serve.
• Use social and video to help your journalism travel further either on your own or working with our social and video specialists.
• You need to be adept at technology, picking up new skills and adapting to the changing demands of a digital working environment.
• The role requires weekend working and early and late shifts.

Are you the right candidate?

The ideal candidate will meet the following criteria:

• Have substantial experience of working in a daily news environment.
• The ability to write clean, accurate and concise copy with quick turnaround times, for publication on the BBC website.
• Have sound editorial judgement, making decisions on matters of editorial sensitivity under pressure.
• A good understanding of media law and the BBC’s editorial guidelines.
• An ability to deliver original journalism.
• Be familiar with social media in a news context and know how to make the most of various platforms to reach a range of audiences.
• Understanding of SEO within a news context to help our stories reach the people most interested in and impacted by them.
• A keen eye for strong imagery to make stories standout online and be able do basic photo editing.

About the BBC

The BBC is committed to redeploying employees seeking suitable alternative employment within the BBC for different reasons and they will be given priority consideration ahead of other applicants. Priority consideration means for those employees seeking redeployment their application will be considered alongside anyone else at risk of redundancy, prior to any individuals being considered who are not at risk.
We don’t focus simply on what we do – we also care how we do it. Our values and the way we behave are important to us. Please make sure you’ve read about our values and behaviours here.
Diversity matters at the BBC. We have a working environment where we value and respect every individual's unique contribution, enabling all of our employees to thrive and achieve their full potential.
We want to attract the broadest range of talented people to be part of the BBC – whether that’s to contribute to our programming or our wide range of non-production roles. The more diverse our workforce, the better able we are to respond to and reflect our audiences in all their diversity.
We are committed to equality of opportunity and welcome applications from individuals, regardless of age, gender, ethnicity, disability, sexual orientation, gender identity, socio-economic background, religion and/or belief. We will consider flexible working requests for all roles, unless operational requirements prevent otherwise.
To find out more about Diversity and Inclusion at the BBC, please click here.