Publishing / editorial director, Radar

Closing date: 29th April 2024

Salary: Up to £75,000 dependent on experience and location (+bonus + benefits)

Location: This role can be based at our London office, or at any of our new regional offices in Sheffield, Edinburgh, Newcastle or Bristol, with a blend of in-office (3 days) and homeworking (2 days) per week.

Do you want to run your own imprint?  A unique opportunity has arisen to run our commercial non-fiction imprint, Radar – home of celebrities, platform publishing and trend-led idea creation! 

Octopus publish books for everyone. We love to enlighten, nourish, entertain and most of all inspire readers and listeners everywhere. We're a leading publisher of non-fiction books, working to publish exciting, market-leading books across our many unique imprints, including Philip's maps and guides. 

Octopus is a division of Hachette, one of the largest publishing groups in the UK, with 12 publishing divisions and over 60 imprints. Everyone here is proud to be in the business of opening doors and minds.

Launched 2022, Radar showcases the best pop culture talent, emerging and established: from household names with core fanbases to platform stars with dedicated communities. With Radar’s founder deciding to take a career break, we seek an experienced, energetic commissioner to run the imprint. 

Heading up the Radar imprint you will be commissioning approximately 15 titles a year, including paperbacks, working with authors and Octopus colleagues to produce and publish the books.

If you are Editorial Director, Publishing Director, or even an ambitious Commissioning Editor, we want to talk to you – what matters to us is your talent and vision. Reporting to the Monoray publisher you would be supported as part of Octopus’s non-fiction team, but responsible for your own imprint and strategy.

Who we're looking for

• We are looking for an editor with good commissioning experience and a proven successful track record of publishing in this pop culture/mass-market area.
• You will be motivated, self-starting and a popular culture junkie.  Let’s turn your dream of running your own imprint into reality.

What we offer

Our staff are our greatest asset, and our benefits reflect this:

• 28 annual leave days per year, increases to 29 days after 2 years' service and goes up to 30 days after 5 years' (+ bank holidays)
• Private medical insurance
• Generous pension schemes
• Rent deposit loans
• 2 community days per year
• Summer hours (finishing at 1pm on Fridays during the summer months)
• Retail discounts through Hachette rewards
• Cycle to Work scheme
• Eye care vouchers
• Wide-ranging training library
• Development programmes (including mentoring)
• Up to 70% off book purchases
• A charity bookshelf
• 12 Staff-led employee networks that are voluntary, including Gender Balance, Thrive, Pride, All Together, Wellbeing and religious networks
• Season ticket loans
• And much more!

Our commitment

Hachette employs people on the basis of their abilities. We aim to attract and develop talent from a base as broad as the world of readers we want to reach, with a wide and representative range of age, faith, disability, race, gender, sexuality and socio-economic, regional and cultural backgrounds.

If you are shortlisted and need us to make any adjustments to help you attend for interview, please let us know.

Please state in your application that you found this role through Creative Access.

The Book Trade Charity offers financial support to people looking to enter the book trade but who may struggle to afford the costs of attending interviews and undertaking junior roles. For more information visit www.booktradeentrysupport.org