Working under the guidance of the Editor-in-Chief and Deputy Editors, the Senior Managing Editor handles the day-to-day administrative functions for the print and online Joint Commission Journal on Quality and Patient Safety. This position is also the primary point of contact for all production and publication issues for the journal’s Publisher (currently Elsevier). Reviews all submissions to the journal to determine if they meet the journal’s content parameters and coordinates and assigns articles to Deputy Editors for review. Coordinates and ensures the integrity of the double-blinded peer review of articles.  Tracks all manuscripts through the submission, review, revision, acceptance, editing, and production processes using Editorial Manager software from Elsevier. Oversees editing standards for the journal, working with the Publisher’s Journal Manager to ensure high-quality substantive editing, revision, and proofreading of all accepted articles and issues.  Responsible for quality control for published articles and issues, including any additional content on the website. Works with editorial leadership to create editorials, commentaries, interviews, and other supplementary materials in support of key articles and topics and leverages that content to enhance the reach and visibility of the journal. Identifies and coordinates print issues, including cover photos, table of contents blurbs, house ads, and so on. Collaborates with editorial leadership, enterprise Communications, and the Publisher on marketing and public relations for the journal. Responsible for all JJournal social media, selecting appropriate articles and topics for posting and commentary. Tracks and reports journal metrics to all appropriate stakeholders and coordinates editorial meetings with Deputy Editors and the entire Editorial Advisory Board.

Journal administrative, business, and correspondence management: 

• Handles the day-to-day administrative, business, correspondence, and other support functions for the journal.
• Primary point of contact with the journal’s Publisher.
• Assists editorial leadership (including the Editor-in-Chief, Deputy Editors, Associate Editors, Assistant Editors, and Editorial Advisory Board as well as Executive Director, Global Publishing) in achieving the goals of the journal, including overall functioning of the journal, coordinating and taking minutes for all editorial leadership meetings, managing appropriate author and reviewer correspondence, facilitating content decisions, and related tasks.
• Handles contracting and payments to external editors as appropriate.

Coordination of Peer Review:

• Reviews all submissions to the journal to determine if they meet its content parameters, provide requisite information, and meet basic language standards for scientific literature.
• Coordinates the peer-review of designated articles, ensuring that peer review invitations are sent to an appropriate number of qualified reviewers, that reviewers respond in a timely way, and that reviewer comments are evaluated and, as appropriate, communicated to corresponding authors, all the while adhering to the journal's reviewer integrity and confidentiality policies.
• Contracts and oversees the Assistant Editor cadre that provides reviews of specified articles.
• Creates and maintains a robust reviewer database.

Editing Standards:

• Responsible for the editing standards for the Journal, working with the Publisher's Journal Manager to ensure the high quality of substantive editing, revision, and proofreading of all accepted articles and compiled issues.
• Monitors any disclosure of use of artificial intelligence (AI) tools in all articles and ensures that any such AI use falls within acceptable parameters established in Journal and Publisher policy on AI.
• Understands and attends to complex technical content (including tables, figures, photographs, and line art) in addition to style, format, accuracy, clarity, and consistency.
• Responsible for quality of published articles and issues, including commentaries, editorials, and/or letters as well as multimedia content (e.g., video interviews and transcripts) that may be appended to the articles or developed for the website.
• At the direction of editorial leadership, edits certain articles as necessary.

Journal Liaison:

• The appointed liaison for journal production with the editorial leadership team and the publisher (Elsevier).
• The publisher's primary contact for all day-to-day production issues, including scheduling and web posting for individual articles and issues.
• Ensures that each issue is published and posted according to schedules.
• Gathers and tracks all data and metrics for the journal and maintains the dashboard that is used to monitor article and issue flow, timeliness, peer review, financials, and other key measures of success.

Production Oversight:

• Collaborates with Production during copyediting, typesetting, and proofreading.
• Reviews copyeditor’s changes, answers proofreaders’ queries, and checks layout as necessary.
• Ensures that author edits are incorporated as appropriate by Production.
• Directs print and digital layout and presentation of data in tables and figures to ensure that all articles follow established design standards and are intelligible to intended professional audiences.

Journal Table of Contents and Précis:

• Responsible for assembling issues under the direction of editorial leadership, crafting Tables of Contents, and writing brief blurbs on all accepted articles that can be used in the journal's table of contents and on its website. These blurbs are reviewed by editorial leadership to ensure they accurately describe article content.

Marketing and Public Relations:

• Participates in determining and implementing marketing and public relations for the journal, in collaboration with the Publisher (Elsevier) and the sponsoring organization (Joint Commission).
• Reviews promotional copy and press releases as needed.
• Participates in conceptualizing, creating, and/or securing multimedia content on the journal website to complement the peer-reviewed articles, with the goal of maintaining a dynamic web presence for the journal.
• Works with editorial leadership to create video interviews in support of key articles and topics and leverages that content to enhance the reach and visibility of the journal.
• Responsible for the journal’s social media, including identifying and posting key articles and topics with meaningful contextual comments to engage social media users

• The level of knowledge equivalent to that ordinarily acquired through completion of a bachelor’s degree in English or journalism.
• At least 5 to 7 years of experience managing the peer review and production processes of a scholarly journal in the health sciences. Experience in working with an online manuscript submission and tracking system.
• Excellent communication skills, both in writing and orally. Succinct, effective, and professional at all times.
• Strong substantive editing skills and ability to recognize and articulate content development needs. Ability to understand, analyze, edit, and communicate complex material in a wide range of healthcare areas and ensure effective communication of same.
• Excellent time management skills and comprehensive attention to details. Able to successfully manage multiple projects, work well under pressure, and adhere to all editorial and production schedules and deadlines.
• Interpersonal skills needed to interact with and elicit cooperation of internal staff and external authors, reviewers, and content experts.
• High level of professionalism and commitment to high standards, assertiveness, integrity, and discriminating judgment

We offer a comprehensive benefit package. For a complete overview of our benefits package, please visit our Joint Commission Career Page 

This job description is intended to describe the general nature and level of work performed by an employee assigned to this position. The description is not an exhaustive list of all duties, responsibilities, knowledge, skills, and abilities, and working conditions associated with this position. All requirements are subject to possible modification and reasonably accommodate individuals with disabilities.