A financial editor is one who works on a newspaper and is in charge of the financial section. He or she may also be referred to as a section editor or desk editor; this means he is in charge of this one particular section of the paper, but generally reports to the managing editor of the entire newspaper. A financial editor is responsible for all of the content in the financial section of the paper, which means assigning articles to reporters and editing the articles when they are turned in, among other duties.
The financial editor will generally need to meet frequently with the managing editor, as well as the other section editors, to discuss the newspaper and the type of content that should be included. He or she will then take those ideas, and go to the various reporters who work in the financial section of the paper and assign articles; reporters may also be responsible for coming up with their own ideas and submitting them to the financial editor for approval. The articles will generally be a mix of hard news and soft news.
Hard news is current events in the financial world, for example, whereas soft news may be more human interest stories such as ideas for saving money on utility bills. The financial editor will need to choose which of these articles will be published in each edition of the newspaper; hard news will usually take precedence over human interest stories. It is important that the financial section of the newspaper remain informative while still capturing the interest of the reader.
Each article that is published in the newspaper is generally checked by the financial editor to make sure there are no stylistic or grammatical errors. A copy editor may also work on the article to check for items such as punctuation, or to create catchy headlines. Typically, the reporter who writes the article is responsible for his or her own fact-checking, but this can vary depending on the size of the newspaper.
Generally, one who wants to become a financial editor will have a four year college degree in journalism or communications, and often a dual degree in a business or financial field. Some may even have experience working in the finance industry. He or she will generally begin working on a newspaper in an entry-level position such as copy editing, and may then become a reporter or a staff writer before eventually becoming an editor.