Term: Permanent, Full-Time
Location: Remote, anywhere in Canada
Compensation: Starting $51,000 to $56,000/year
Closing date: January 31, 2025
We’re looking for a talented and motivated Labour Reporter to join our team of journalists. This position involves producing original investigative reporting on a wide range of issues focused on labour and big business in Canada, along with the intersections of labour with broader issues such as income inequality, housing, climate change, systemic and systematic discrimination, and more.
About PressProgress:
PressProgress is an award-winning non-profit news organization with full-time unionized journalists focused on uncovering and unpacking the news through original investigative and explanatory journalism.
Our journalism focuses on holding the rich and powerful accountable, exposing unfair and unhealthy workplace practices, and shining a light on hate and bigotry. Several million Canadians read our stories every year and our work has been cited by every major news organization in Canada, as well as by prominent news organizations in the United States and Europe.
About this job:
Reporting to the Publisher, the Labour Reporter is a full-time journalist that plans, coordinates and develops weekly content related to the labour sector for the PressProgress website in collaboration with PressProgress Editors. This role is part of the PressProgress news team, aiding in the production and distribution of content using a variety of media (text, image, video) and distributing PressProgress content as needed and directed by the Publisher. This position is committed to the growth and brand quality of the website and performs their duties in keeping with PressProgress’ Journalistic Standards and the Broadbent Principles for Canadian Social Democracy.
KEY RESPONSIBILITIES
- Reporting: Produces one article per week or 3-4 investigations per month by proposing and pitching original stories covering the labour sector, researching, interviewing, conducting fieldwork, and writing and publishing stories for the PressProgress website. Labour stories are diverse, covering Canadian services and industries in both the public and private sector.
- Time Management: Manages time effectively by working on long-term investigations while balancing quick-turnaround stories as needed.
- Story Development: Works independently to cultivate sources and monitor news and social feeds to identify potential stories, while working with the news team to develop impactful angles, ensure research and content is original, accurate, balanced, well-sourced, fact-checked, with attention to journalistic and legal standards.
- Publication: Submits story drafts to an Editor for collaborative review, and adapts stories for a digital audience ensuring content is engaging and accessible using a variety of media as needed.
- Audience Engagement: Creates and participates in outreach and marketing plans to sustain and grow the PressProgress audience, including the overarching content strategy, business plan, and project-specific promotional plans and goals.
- Collaboration: Works with the PressProgress team, including Editors, reporters, and the Publisher, on everything from story-ideas, joint investigations, to short-term and long-term strategies to achieve organizational and editorial goals.
- Source Cultivation: Builds and maintains working relationships with a wide range of sources and contacts, including workers in union and nonunionized work environments, community members, experts, and academics, to ensure a diversity of perspectives is represented in our journalism.
- Impact and Service Journalism: Prioritizes stories that are of significant public interest, ensuring our journalism engages and informs audiences, strengthens our community connections, and empowers readers to participate in real-world change.
- Newsletter: Monitors labour and business activity in the media and their respective communication channels to curate, produce, and distribute a weekly digital labour newsletter, Shift Work, rounding up Canadian labour news and tracking all active strikes and lockouts.
QUALIFICATIONS
- Minimum two years experience working in journalism
- Postsecondary degree in a field focused on journalism, public policy, labour studies, or communications
- Strong writing skills, critical thinking skills and a careful eye for detail
- Demonstrated knowledge of Canadian labour history, present-day organized labour, the skilled trades, Canadian industries, and labour legislation at the federal and provincial levels
- Ability to work both independently and collaboratively in a fast-paced news environment
- In-depth knowledge of the Canadian political landscape and familiarity with key figures in political, media and labour / business circles
- Experience filing FOIs, obtaining public records and other relevant research skills
- Experience with video, audio or graphic design and other digital media tools
- Fluency in French is an asset
Full-time editorial and reporting positions for PressProgress are governed under a collective agreement between the Broadbent Institute and United Food and Commercial Workers’ local 1006-A. PressProgress operations are conducted in English. Our offices are located in Ottawa and Toronto, although remote work is possible and requires working from home.
The starting salary of this position is $51,000 to $56,000 annually, in addition to generous paid vacation time and a comprehensive benefits package.
How to apply:
Please forward a cover letter, resume and two examples of past published journalistic work to careers[at]pressprogress[dot]ca with “Labour Reporter, PressProgress” in the subject line by January 31, 2025. As per Broadbent Institute policy, shortlisted candidates are compensated for the interview process.
