With editor Thom Fladung leaving for the number-two job in Cleveland, Pioneer Press officials are looking beyond their own shop for his successor, according to an help-wanted ad management recently placed in Editor & Publisher. If you want in, you'll have to be a digitally savvy east-metro-focused swashbuckler:

The Editor will foster an environment of innovation and risk-taking, breaking big local stories and producing quality journalism that can only be found in the Pioneer Press and on twincities.com. The Editor will have a strong reader and market focus, framing stories to put readers first and show an in-depth knowledge and understanding of our market.

The Editor will both understand and embrace technology through the steadfast delivery of real-time news online, spurring the development of interactive content and growing online social media. ...

The ideal candidate will have 10+ years of journalism and management experience, preferably as senior editor in a metropolitan newspaper and/or an online news publication.

The openness to an online person is noteworthy.

The ad (which doesn't appear on the PiPress site or that of its owner, MediaNews Group) doesn't necessarily mean the new editor will be an outsider. Because the PiPress cannibalized the managing editor position amid budget cuts to preserve newsgatherers, no number-two is primed to step up. However, two internal names mentioned are senior editor/local news Sue Campbell and editorial page editor Mike Burbach.

Asked if she was a candidate Campbell deferred comment to publisher Guy Gilmore, who did not respond to an email. Burbach — who edited papers in Minot, N.D. and Columbus, Ga. before coming to St. Paul — also declined to say if he was in, but added, "We're doing a national search, as you know, and that's good. It's early in the process, and we'll see how it develops."

This is the first time the Pioneer Press has chosen a leader since the Great Newspaper Depression of 2008-2009, and the prominence of the hire could signal the paper's direction. Despite stable circulation amid industry declines, Fladung was not allowed to replace departing reporters for nearly two years. That's changed in the last two cases; the PiPress currently has a vacancy for a state Capitol reporter with Jason Hoppin's departure.

The E&P ad has an expiration date of March 1; Gilmore has told staffers the choice will be made "in all deliberate haste."