Application Instructions
Please list all professional experience and explain any gaps in employment history. All of your application materials, which may include PDF files of work samples and/or links to audio, video, photography or graphics, must be uploaded to the field labeled Resume/Cover Letter/Work Samples to be considered for the position.
Join the future of news
We’re on a mission to deliver riveting storytelling for all of America. At The Washington Post, you’ll help reinvent news. Our work is driven by a deep investigative spirit and enhanced by innovation to bring audiences closer to the stories that matter most.
About Our Team
The Washington Post is powered by the passion and talent of our people. It takes all of us to reinvent news. Beyond our award-winning News and Opinions teams, we work across many departments, including Brand & Events, Communications, Customer Care, Engineering & Product, Finance, Human Resources, Legal, Marketing & Advertising, Print Operations, and Sales.
Why This Role Matters
The Washington Post is seeking an experienced, imaginative and highly collaborative Senior Photo Assignment Editor to help lead photographic coverage across the newsroom.
We are looking for a visual journalist with exceptional news judgment, sophisticated visual taste and a deep understanding of how photography can distinguish and elevate journalism. This editor will help shape coverage from the earliest stages — identifying stories with strong visual potential, commissioning photographers with distinctive perspectives and ensuring that photography is integral to how our journalism is conceived, reported and presented.
The ideal candidate understands that powerful photography depends not only on what we commission and publish, but also on how audiences experience that work. They will think critically about image selection, sequencing, cropping and presentation and understand how those choices should evolve across mobile and desktop experiences, social platforms, newsletters and other destinations.
This editor should be equally comfortable directing photographic coverage of a major breaking-news event, developing an ambitious visual enterprise project and collaborating across disciplines to determine the strongest form for a story. As a senior member of the Photo department, they will also provide leadership and mentorship to photo editors, helping elevate the ambition, creativity and quality of The Post’s visual journalism.
This position is based in our Washington, D.C., newsroom and will include some evening and weekend shifts to meet deadlines and respond to breaking news.
What Motivates You:
You believe photography can reveal dimensions of a story that words alone cannot capture.
You have a sophisticated visual sensibility and are constantly looking for original approaches to familiar subjects.
You thrive on the urgency of breaking news as well as the opportunity to develop ambitious visual enterprise.
You enjoy working closely with photographers and helping them produce distinctive, surprising work.
You think deeply about how audiences experience photography across different platforms and formats.
You are energized by mentoring visual journalists and helping raise the creative ambition of a team.
How You’ll Support the Mission:
Assign, commission and edit photography for breaking news, daily coverage, features, investigations and ambitious visual enterprise.
Develop and pitch original photographic story ideas, including journalism conceived from the outset around the strengths of photography.
Identify visual opportunities early in the reporting process and work with reporters and editors across the newsroom to develop strong approaches.
Direct photographers in the field, providing clear editorial guidance while creating the conditions for distinctive and original work.
Apply exceptional visual and news judgment to image selection, sequencing, cropping and presentation.
Make thoughtful decisions about how…