Senior Journalist (On the Day) Job BBC, Nairobi, Kenya

AI summary

BBC Swahili seeks a Senior Journalist (On the Day) to lead digital-first news commissioning, editorial oversight, and multimedia production across radio, TV, and digital platforms in Nairobi. The role requires strong news instincts, digital editorial mindset, and ability to manage fast-paced shifts.

• Digital-first commissioning and editorial lead role at BBC Swahili.
• Work across radio, TV, and digital platforms including TikTok, Instagram, YouTube.
• Manage shift teams and ensure high-quality breaking news coverage.
• Use audience analytics to optimize content performance.

Description

Home » Jobs In Kenya » Journalism Jobs In Kenya » Senior Journalist (On the Day) Job BBC, Nairobi, Kenya Job Title: Senior Journalist (On the Day) Date Posted: 20260722 Job Type: Full Time Job Level: Management Employer: BBC Industry: Journalism Salary: Open Location: Nairobi Country: Kenya Deadline: 20260805 Summary: Journalism Jobs, BBC Jobs. Looking for a journalism job in Kenya? BBC is hiring a Senior Journalist (On the Day) skilled in live news reporting, story editorial judgment, digital content production, and breaking news coverage. Purpose of the Role BBC Swahili is one of the BBC World Service’s biggest and fastest-growing language services, reaching millions of Swahili speakers across East Africa and beyond. Operating across radio, TV and digital platforms, the service provides independent, impartial journalism to audiences whose access to free and trusted news is often limited by political pressure, media restrictions and disinformation. BBC Swahili is transforming into a story-led model built around two complementary editorial streams: On the Day and On Demand. Why Join the Team The Senior Journalist, On the Day, is the on-shift editorial lead: the person who makes the calls, drives the commissioning, holds the output together and sets the pace and standards for the digital, radio and TV teams around them. The role demands strong news instincts, a clear digital-first editorial mindset, and the confidence to lead journalists and presenters through a fast-moving shift across multiple platforms 7 days a week. The BBC Swahili On the Day stream serves a large and loyal radio and TV audience alongside a growing digital following. A key part of this role is helping to connect those audiences using radio and TV output to drive listeners and viewers towards BBC Swahili’s digital platforms, and ensuring digital content is produced with the habits and needs of that broader audience in mind. The postholder works across morning, afternoon or night shifts, deputising for the Assistant Editor, On the Day as required. Responsibilities Drive a digital-first commissioning approach across the shift, ensuring every story is planned and produced for digital publication from the outset, with relevant content produced for TV and radio as much as possible. Oversee continuous digital publishing on the BBC Swahili website, commissioning and editing articles, video embeds, image galleries and social media posts to maintain a regular publishing rhythm that keeps audiences returning throughout the day. Commission and edit short-form video and social media content for TikTok, Instagram Reels, Facebook and YouTube Shorts, ensuring assets are created from daily news stories as a standard part of the production workflow. Use audience analytics tools to monitor digital performance during and after each shift, identifying what is resonating with audiences and adjusting commissioning and publishing decisions accordingly. Supervise the daily production of BBC Swahili’s visualized and linear radio output, ensuring the live programme is produced and broadcast to a high standard and is simultaneously suitable for streaming on YouTube. Commission and oversee BBC Swahili’s TV output during the shift, working with the TV production team to ensure packages, headlines and programme segments are delivered on time and to standard. Manage the practical workflow of the shift, assigning tasks, monitoring progress against deadlines and redistributing resource as the news agenda changes. Contribute to the training and development of junior journalists, providing constructive in-shift coaching on digital production, writing, video and cross-platform working. Qualifications Demonstrable experience of leading digital-first news output, with a clear understanding of what drives engagement, traffic and audience growth on digital platforms. Hands-on experience of commissioning and editing content for multiple digital platforms simultaneously, including news website, YouTube, TikTok, Instagram Reels, Facebook and YouTube Shorts. Strong working knowledge of audience analytics tools and the ability to act on performance data in real time during a shift. Clear understanding of what makes content perform on each platform: optimising for search on the website, maximising watch time on YouTube, driving shares on Facebook, and producing high-retention vertical video for TikTok and Reels. Experience of producing or supervising visualised radio or TV output, with a clear understanding of how to make broadcast content work simultaneously for audio and on-screen audiences. Understanding of TV news production workflows, including the ability to work with producers, camera operators and presenters to deliver packages and programmes to tight deadlines. Excellent scripting, writing and sub-editing skills in Swahili and English How to Apply Click here to apply 🎯 Applying for This Job? Don’t Send a Generic CV. Don’t send the same CV to every job/employer. Have our recr