Strategic Advisor, Digital Innovation, LAist

Position Summary:

LAist is seeking a visionary, high-level Strategic Advisor to guide the reimagining of LAist as a next-generation platform. This fractional advisory role will help shape the long-term roadmap for LAist’s digital presence—ensuring it is audience-first, AI-ready, and revenue-resilient.

The Strategic Advisor will work closely with senior leaders across departments to align vision, product strategy, and innovation goals. They will define big-picture priorities and success metrics, identify future-forward features and formats, and guide cross-functional teams in transforming LAist into a dynamic, trusted entry point to public life in Southern California. This is a strategic, non-operational role focused on long-range impact—not daily execution.

Please note a preferred candidate has been identified for this position.

Work Location: Pasadena, CA | Hybrid

Expected Compensation Range:$52.00 - $55.00 / hourly. Exact hourly rate will be determined by experience and education related to the role, organizational compensation structure, geographical location and internal equity.

Application Requirement: Applicants must be authorized to work for ANY employer in the U.S. We are unable to sponsor or take over sponsorship of an employment Visa at this time.

Application Deadline: Monday, August 4, 2025 (Noon PDT)


Your Responsibilities:

• Lead the strategic vision for LAist as a digital platform optimized for audience engagement, trust, and discovery across AI, search, and emerging interfaces.
• Develop a clear roadmap for platform transformation, advising on priorities across content structure, user experience, and product functionality.
• Define structured content strategies to ensure LAist stories and resources are machine-readable, reusable, and widely distributed across LLMs and discovery platforms.
• Guide the exploration and design of new revenue opportunities
• Serve as a thought partner to senior leaders across editorial, product, technology, and revenue teams, offering high-level insight, strategic framing, and decision support.
• Translate strategic goals into actionable planning guidance for cross-functional implementation teams, including product, design, and project management.
• Other duties as assigned

Required Education and Experience:

• Bachelor’s degree or equivalent work experience.
• 5 years’ experience managing medium-to-large-scale digital design and development projects.

Required Skills, Knowledge and Abilities:

• Strong knowledge of web technologies and web design, and the delivery of solutions with design and engineering components.
• Understanding of editorial processes and priorities and content generation considerations generally.
• Solid understanding of project management processes, including developing requirements, scope definition, communication, and resource management and risk identification.
• Experience authoring and maintaining essential project documentation, including project management plans, issue and risk logs, and status reports.
• Sharp assessment skills with an ability for ruthless prioritization.
• Strong ability to create clarity amid chaos.
• Comfortable with running lean.
• Solid oral and written communication skills in an interdisciplinary team environment
• Ability to learn new technology quickly
• Ability to work independently with little supervision
• Ability to meet deadlines
• Ability to manage assignments and accountability among stakeholders of varying seniority
• Ability to work under heavy deadline pressure.
• Solid oral and written communication skills.
• Demonstrated ability to work in a team environment.
• Familiarity with communicating technical requirements.

Preferred Skills and Experience:

• Knowledge of SDLC project management frameworks such as Agile, Scrum, or equivalent.
• Experience in working with enterprise or large-scale, consumer-facing digital products.
• Experience with project management platforms such as Asana, Jira or equivalent.
• Experience with Q