Associate Editorial Director, A.I. Initiatives

The New York Times is seeking an associate editorial director to join our newly formed team focused on artificial-intelligence initiatives in the newsroom. The team is charged with ensuring The Times remains on the forefront of digital journalism by prototyping internal and reader-facing applications of generative A.I. and other machine-learning techniques. Our goal is to develop new forms of journalism, empowering reporters across the newsroom with new and useful tools, while establishing principles for the ethical use of these technologies.

As a core member of the team, the associate editorial director will bring their journalistic experience to bear on tools and product features that could improve internal workflows, reporting capabilities, and how The Times is presented to readers. The editor will lead collaboration with other desks in the newsroom, incorporating feedback from reporters and editors into the team’s work. They will also be responsible for ensuring that our use of A.I. serves to elevate and augment the human core of journalism.

The team, led by the editorial director for A.I. initiatives, will also include colleagues with a mix of engineering, research, and design talent, acting as a kind of skunkworks team within the newsroom. Together, they will partner with other teams in the news, product, and technology groups to take the best ideas from prototype to production.

Specific responsibilities include:

Leading collaborations with reporters and editors across the newsroom to identify real-world problems that might be solved with A.I. and collecting feedback

Contributing to the team’s prototypes with ideas, sample copy, and other needs

Developing and continually adapting our guidelines for safe and ethical use of A.I. in the newsroom, in collaboration with the standards desk

Staying up-to-date on the latest A.I. research and model development, to help inform the team’s work and spread technical proficiency throughout the organization

Basic qualifications include:

At least five years of experience in a newsroom

Excellent editorial judgment and journalistic instincts

Understanding of large-language and transformer models

Experience collaborating with engineers and designers in an editorial environment

Excellence at working in cross-functional groups, giving and receiving feedback, and contributing to a team’s culture

Preferred qualifications include:

Deep understanding of machine learning

Experience building web applications or other interfaces powered by APIs

Experience working on experimental editorial products

The ideal candidate for this position is an inveterate tinkerer, eager to experiment with new technologies and share their findings with others. We favor demos over memos, prototypes over concepts, collaboration over silos, and learning over knowing it all. If these values resonate with you, please consider applying regardless of whether you meet all of the qualifications.

The annual base pay salary for this role is between $130,000.00 and $150,000.00.