What are the Ten Qualities of Successful Editors? When you ask top journalists today to name the great magazine editors of the recent past, you tend to hear the same short list. Clay Felker. Harold Hayes. Henry Grunwald. Helen Gurley Brown. Oz Elliott. John Mack Carter. Dick Stolley. And more, of course.

Every one of them had a Big Idea (as Felker did when creating point-of-view journalism), or changed the character and direction of an important magazine (as Grunwald did with Time and Brown with Cosmo), or launched a major magazine (as Stolley did with People). Some of them did all of those things, several times over (Carter created not just one magazine but Country Living and Victoria, and was primarily responsible for SmartMoney).

by Marshall Loeb

Marshall Loeb is Columbia Journalism Review's regular magazine columnist, and also a daily columnist for CBSMarketWatch.com. He was just cited as one of the 100 most important business journalists of the century by a TSFR Business News Report Panel. 

And all of these immortals discovered, developed, taught, nurtured, and influenced impressive numbers of the leading journalists of 2000. Felker's legacy spans from the young Jimmy Breslin and Tom Wolfe to Cyndi Stivers, editor of Time Out New York, and Frank Lalli, newly named editor of George. Oz Elliott's brood includes Steve Shepard, editor of Business Week; Lynn Povich, man aging editor (East coast), MSNBC. com; and Ed Kosner, New York Daily News Sunday editor. They still use some of the master's techniques and ideas. "Of course," says GQ editor Art Cooper, who trained under Harold Hayes at Esquire, "It's no good having heroes if you don't steal from them."

But the question arises: What makes a genuinely great magazine editor today? Let me cite ten characteristics:

"Curiosity is perhaps the main quality," says Henry Grunwald. Editor Henry Luce, for example, was obsessively curious about absolutely everything in the world. I recall when, as a junior writer at Time in the mid-fifties, I attended a small luncheon with Luce in Rockefeller Center. A newly hired farm writer was also present; somehow we stumbled onto the arcane subject of how chickens reproduce — and Luce was captivated. I swear that the rest of the working lunch focused on the serious, sober subject of chicken fornicating. (Not because of this, I consider Luce and Grunwald the two true geniuses I have encountered in journalism.)

The second quality of the great editor is a kind of empathy, a bond with the reader, an almost subliminal notion of what will be interesting and important to her or him — even though the reader might not know so at the time.

Third, the editor needs self-confidence, strong enough that it will not be swayed by a seeming setback or polls or a focus group. Yes, you listen to those things, says Grunwald, but you have an inner sense of what you want to do — and you do it.

"I admire what Graydon Carter does at Vanity Fair," he adds, "because it seems so much against the grain. Graydon runs these ancient Hollywood stories. Any body else would ask, ‘Who-wants-to-read-about-old-so-and-so?' But Gray don has enough self-confidence to say ‘If it's of interest to me, it will be of interest to everybody.'"

"Follow your instincts," advises GQ's Cooper. "I don't regret any piece I ever published. I regret only the pieces I was talked out of publishing."

Echoes Grunwald: "When I was editor of Time, I changed the cover many times at the very last moment, and I never regretted it. What I do regret is some of the covers I didn't change."

Fourth, the editor has to be absolutely fearless, whether dealing with pushy advertisers, pressuring publishers, money-hungry investment bankers — or his own staff. Felker was totally fearless. For example, after the New York Herald Tribune folded in 1966, he simply went out among the venture capitalists and raised millions to buy the rights to the paper's Sunday supplement, New York magazine, which he led to glory. Felker had never done anything like this before, but associates say that the idea of failure never entered his mind.

Fifth, the editor needs stamina. Andre Laguerre, the legendary editor of Sports Illustrated (1960-74), defined this as both the physical stamina needed to fill the grinding demands of the job, and the intellectual stamina required to suffer idiosyncratic talents constantly and willingly.

Sixth, the editor does not have to be a terrific writer but, rather like the eunuch in the harem, he needs to know how to spot sensational performance — and stimulate it. In almost any debate between story editors and writers, Clay Felker and Andre Laguerre (among many others) sided with the writers — and that was one reason why New York and Sports Illustrated each became known as "writers' magazines." Con sequently, the super writers wanted to work there. Ditto the best editors. Remarkably, in the 1970s, the top editors of all three Time Inc. weeklies — People's Patricia Ryan, SI's Gil Rogin, Time's Ray Cave — had each prepped under Laguerre for more than ten years.

Seventh, the editor may not be an outstanding writer, but, as Frank Lalli says, "You have to be the best reporter on your staff. You have to get out and get around and persuade your staff to do stories of what people are really talking about on Saturday night."

You also have to get out to see how your readers are changing. As Texas Monthly editor Greg Curtis says, "Every time a magazine loses its way, it's because the editor has lost touch with the audience." My own view is that the only person more dangerous than a chair-bound editor is a New York-based or Wash ington-based chair-bound editor.

Eighth, great editors know that they don't have all the answers, and so they surround themselves with people more knowledgeable and more talented than they. Says Lalli: "When I left Money magazine after ten years, I still didn't know as much about some specific topics as did the experts on my staff, but I knew how to turn out the best magazine possible because I had surrounded myself with true experts."

Ninth, Jacqueline Leo, editor-in-chief, interactive services at Meredith Corporation, says "the greatest thing editors do is say 'no' - 'no, your story doesn't measure up' or 'no, your photo has to be re-shot.' That's hard because some editors don't want to be the bad guy."

To which Ray Cave adds, "I wouldn't consider any of the great editors I've known as being nice guys." He continues, "Patience is a great virtue for an editor, but patience must not be confused with being a nice guy, and it must not be confused with uncertainty. Any sign that the leader is confused is disastrous."

Tenth, at the same time, the great editor today has to be more of a mentor than ever before, more of a nurturing parent than the dictatorial, finger-waving, stern uncle who too often dominated magazines in the past. As Lalli says, "The best journalists now are highly educated, true Renaissance people, who can just as easily move into dot-com or TV or book-writing. You need to be much more a partner with them than ever before, looking for the stories that will challenge them or help them grow. The terrific writers have to say, 'This is where I can do my best work.'"

If you are a great editor, you serve as teacher and role model. And staff members try to emulate you. They may even employ some of your lessons, your principles, your practices for years to come. And if you're that good, you will have achieved not only a touch of greatness but also a bit of immortality.

Courtesy : CJR