Associate Content Manager

About Our Team: 

Our team is a dynamic and collaborative group dedicated to the seamless and high-quality production of academic journals. We are the central hub that orchestrates the journey of research from acceptance to publication, ensuring accuracy, timeliness, and author satisfaction. We pride ourselves on our meticulous attention to detail, problem-solving abilities, and our commitment to facilitating the dissemination of impactful research.

What is your team’s key role in the business?

Journals Production is a cornerstone of Sage Publishing. We are, in many ways, the face of Sage for our valued authors and editors, guiding their work through the critical stages of production. As one of the core departments, we are instrumental in upholding Sage's reputation for publishing high-quality scholarly content and ensuring the timely delivery of cutting-edge research to the academic community. This includes aligning on overall Article Processing Charge (APC) payments, managing license collection for published content, and ultimately contributing to author satisfaction through a smooth and efficient publication experience.

What other departments do you work closely with?

We collaborate extensively with a range of key departments, including:

• IT: For managing our production systems, online platforms, and technical workflows.
• Production Operations: To ensure efficient and streamlined production processes and quality control.
• Editorial: Working in close partnership to manage content flow, author queries, and editorial standards.
• Vendors: Coordinating with external partners for typesetting, printing (if applicable), and other production services.
• Commercial Sales: Supporting their efforts by ensuring timely publication and high-quality presentation of journal content.
• Journals Operations: For APC payment processes and license management.
• Customer Services: To know overall author satisfaction

Could you be our new Associate Content Manager? Are you?

We are seeking a detail-oriented and highly organized Associate Content Manager to take responsibility for the end-to-end publication of a portfolio of journals.

The successful candidate will possess strong project management, communication, and problem-solving skills, with a proven ability to work effectively with internal and external stakeholders. This role offers an excellent opportunity to contribute to the dissemination of impactful research within a dynamic and collaborative environment.

Essential Skills and Experience:

• Demonstrable experience as a Production Editor or equivalent.
• Proven ability to manage multiple projects simultaneously and meet strict deadlines.
• Excellent written and verbal communication and time management skills.
• Ability to work independently and as part of a team.
• Competency in MS Office applications (Outlook, Word, Excel).
• Ability to adapt to and thrive in a constantly changing work environment.

Preferred Skills and Experience:

• Experience working within a lean framework.
• Knowledge of metadata standards relevant to academic publishing.
• Understanding of the academic publishing industry.
• Experience in managing journal transitions.
• A proactive approach to identifying and implementing process improvements.

Your new role:

At Sage Publishing, we're passionate about disseminating groundbreaking research to the world. As an Associate Content Manager, you'll play a crucial role in bringing this research to life, taking ownership of the publication journey for a portfolio of academic journals. You'll be at the heart of the action, collaborating with leading academics and ensuring the highest standards of quality and timely delivery.

We're seeking a highly organized and proactive individual who excels at managing complex projects and building strong relationships. If you're a natural problem-solver with exceptional communication skills and a drive for continuous improvement, we want to hear from you!

KEY ACCOUNTABILITIES

• Takes full responsibility for the publication of their list of journals. 
• Ensures individual articles are completed by suppliers to agreed turnaround times and quality.
• Advises journal editors, board members and contributors, referring queries elsewhere in Sage as necessary, in order to maintain healthy working relationships with external partners. 
• Appraises the quality of work carried out by suppliers and reports to senior management.
• Advises supplier managers on the services required by particular journals (e.g. turnaround times or specialist editing).
• Resolves complex queries independently and acts as an escalation point from the supplier.
• Scopes the definition of department project requirements, goals and deliverable schedules in accordance with KPIs.
• Monitors project progress, risks and issues, reports on key metrics and uses initiative and judgment to address projects that are going off track and escalate to senior leadership team as appropriate.
• Creates and embeds workflow streamlining possibilities and new metadata requirements as required, liaising with Editorial, PTD and IT and operating within a lean framework.
• Keeps manager and internal publishing editor informed of any developments affecting scheduling, relationships or budgeting, and liaises with other departments as required.
• Liaises with commercial sales to ensure timely publication of supplements and advertising with revenue negotiated by commercial sales
• Takes responsibility for quality of metadata accompanying articles, as required by the business
• Manage transitions of journals from PE management to supplier project management
• Attends conferences, inputs into publishing reports and editorial board meetings as required.

A cover letter is important to us, this offers the hiring manager valuable insights into how your skill set aligns with the role, what unique contributions you can bring to the team and why you are interested in this position. Therefore, when applying for this role online, please upload your cover letter and CV as one document.

Applications without a cover letter may regrettably not be reviewed.

Diversity, Equity, and Inclusion

At Sage we are committed to building a diverse and inclusive team that is representative of all sections of society and to sustaining a culture that celebrates difference, encourages authenticity, and creates a deep sense of belonging. We welcome applications from all members of society irrespective of age, disability, sex or gender identity, sexual orientation, color, race, nationality, ethnic or national origin, religion or belief as creating value through diversity is what makes us strong.