The ACLU seeks a full-time Director of Editorial Strategy & Storytelling in the Marketing & Communications Department of the ACLU’s National office in New York, NY. This is a hybrid role that has in-office requirements of two (2) days per week or eight (8) days per month.
The ACLU Marketing & Communications Department creates, maintains, and expands message narratives to engage our supporters and other target audiences, to help protect and expand civil liberties and civil rights, and illustrate the value and impact of the ACLU’s work. Through our messaging, engagement with newsmakers, our written and social content, branding, and visual identity, we encourage support for the ACLU and help to create a more perfect union.
Reporting to the Head of Brand Studio, the Director of Editorial Strategy & Storytelling is a senior leader within the Brand Studio unit of the Communications & Marketing team. They are charged with aligning and advancing the organization’s storytelling and editorial strategy across teams and platforms. This role leads the development of a unified editorial vision that connects content across the ACLU’s ecosystem - through editorial planning, creative campaign building, story gathering infrastructure, ethical storytelling practices, and deep cross-functional collaboration. The Director of Editorial Strategy & Storytelling will work closely with the Head of Brand Studio to guide narrative priorities across departments, ensuring that storytelling efforts are rooted in strategy and research, aligned with advocacy goals, and designed to grow and diversify the ACLU’s audience in ways that support the needs of local, state and national ACLU entities. The ideal candidate is a strategic storyteller with exceptional writing, research and project management skills, capable of translating complex legal and policy issues into accessible narratives and sourcing powerful stories and storytellers who bring our broad civil liberties agenda to life.
Equal parts editorial architect, research translator, and creative campaign strategist, the Director of Editorial Strategy & Storytelling will partner with the Head of Brand Studio to lead a coordinated storytelling roadmap and editorial calendar that aligns with the ACLU’s legal, policy, and advocacy priorities. They will build and manage a centralized story bank to elevate impactful narratives and storytellers, and transform complex legal, policy, and research insights into clear, values-driven storytelling. The Director of Editorial Strategy & Storytelling manages the Managing Editor and Content Writer, providing editorial guidance, mentorship, and strategic direction to help them deliver consistent, high-quality content that aligns with the ACLU’s voice and goals. They will also oversee the ACLU’s editorial style guide, story gathering protocols, and ethical storytelling practices, serving as the organization’s go-to resource for how stories are collected and told - setting standards, coaching staff, and providing training on strategic, inclusive, and trauma-informed storytelling that aligns with the ACLU’s values and the communities we serve.
Team Management & Development
Editorial Leadership
Editorial Standards & Practices
For over 100 years, the ACLU has worked to defend and preserve the individual rights and liberties guaranteed by the Constitution and laws of the United States. Whether it’s ending mass incarceration, achieving full equality for the LGBTQ+ community, establishing new privacy protections for our digital age, or preserving the right to vote or the right to have an abortion, the ACLU takes up the toughest civil liberties cases and issues to defend all people.
We know that great people make a great organization. We value our people and know that what we offer is essential not just their work, but to their overall well-being.
At the ACLU, we offer a broad range of benefits, which include:
Accessibility, equity, diversity and inclusion are core values of the ACLU and central to our work to advance liberty, equality, and justice for all. For us diversity, equity, accessibility, and inclusion are not just check-the-box activities, but a chance for us to make long-term meaningful change. We are a community committed to learning and growth, humility and grace, transparency and accountability. We believe in a collective responsibility to create a culture of belonging for all people within our organization – one that respects and embraces difference; treats everyone equitably; and empowers our colleagues to do the best work possible. We are as committed to anti-oppression, anti-ableism, and anti-racism internally as we are externally. Because whether we’re in the courts or in the office, we believe ‘We the People’ means all of us.
With this commitment in mind, we strongly encourage applications from all qualified individuals without regard to race, color, religion, gender, sexual orientation, gender identity or expression, age, national origin, marital status, citizenship, disability, veteran status and record of arrest or conviction, or any other characteristic protected by applicable law.
The ACLU is committed to providing reasonable accommodation to individuals with disabilities. If you are a qualified individual with a disability and need assistance applying online, please email benefits.hrdept@aclu.org. If you are selected for an interview, you will receive additional information regarding how to request an accommodation for the interview process.