Journalist in Residence

Instrumental technology is used by the world’s most admired electronics brands like Bose, Cisco, and SolarEdge to significantly reduce the 20 cents of waste in every dollar spent on manufacturing. Our technology leverages AI from data coming off of the manufacturing floor to automate failure identification and resolution – improving yield, quality, and time to market.

AI will transform manufacturing—the question is when and who. Part of Instrumental’s marketing strategy has been to build the premier knowledge brand in the market: Build Better. The Build Better brand includes a handbook, print magazine, newsletter, webinars, and live events. The topics and content are timely and authentic – agitating the pain of our customers while recognizing and profiling leaders in our space. Most of the content comes from me (our CEO) – which keeps it authentic and on the pulse, but is not scaleable.

Instrumental is looking to hire a “Journalist in Residence” to scale our Build Better efforts – to create and pitch ideas, "trend-jack" timely topics, develop sources to interview or engage with in events, and produce high-quality journalistic content in written and other formats. You’ll work closely with our marketing team, internal subject matter experts, and C-Suite to drive organic audience growth and make Build Better the 100 lb gorilla in the electronics manufacturing knowledge-sphere.

• Pitch the “right” ideas and be agile. You have your finger on the pulse of the electronics manufacturing zeitgeist. You know what VPs of engineering and operations are thinking about right at this moment and can devise compelling and authentic content ideas to agitate their pain points.
• Make a plan; be agile. You can lay out a compelling content plan and execute against it – but you can also turn on a dime to get Build Better’s story out first when there’s a development that impacts our users and customer personas. You can come up with creative ideas to trend-jack that delight and engage our audiences.
• Develop sources and tap them for stories, interviews, and information. While you’ll be able to tap into the company’s strong network, you will build your own network of sources to leverage in creating content – either on background or in direct interviews.
• Write compelling stories and articles that are knowledge-first for print, web, and other media. This is not a content marketing role; we’re writing knowledge content for a technical audience who can sniff out BS from a mile away. The strategy is to be the go-to place for information no one else covers journalistically, and only mention Instrumental technology where it’s on the nose. You’ll set a new standard for clarity, meatiness, and storytelling in our content. This is not a ghost-writing or executive communications position.

• We believe qualified candidates from this role might never have held a position with a title anywhere near this one (because I literally made it up) – or have never considered working outside of a large media publisher. Here’s what I think it will take:
• Fluency in the electronics manufacturing industry. Our core personas are VPs of engineering and operations, mechanical engineers, process engineers. We focus on high-volume electronics (consumer and B2B), networking and data centers, and defense. This is non-negotiable.
• Ability to write high-quality, direct prose that our personas find credible.
• Proven ability to build or work your network to find sources when one doesn’t readily present itself.
• Knack for identifying story ideas that will resonate in the zeitgeist. Asks great questions.
• Bonus: You are an engineer by training, have former professional experience covering electronics supply chain as a journalist, or have been a founder in the hardware space.

This role is unique because we would consider a broad range of seniority.

The following is a representative annual base salary range for the mid-level within the Bay Area: $120,000 - 145,000. Job level and salary opportunities are evaluated through our interview process—we review each applicant's experience, knowledge, skills, and abilities.

Instrumental is proud to offer a highly-rated variety of benefits, including health, vision, dental, commuter plans, and parental leave.