A Head Writer is a person who is in charge of a television/radio series' writing team. Head writers are part of a serialized series production team, and primetime serials.
They conceive the long-term story of a scripted television or radio series, and write the thrusts, outlining their tale approximately a week at a time, along with their Associate Head Writers, the show's producers, and if they have a Story/Creative Consultant (SC/CC), then they are included as well. A writing team usually holds three meetings a week. Sometimes, there may be a story document for one particular plot, summarizing all of the major beats, but this isn't required for all stories.
The head writer (HW), associate head writers (AHW), breakdown writers (BDW), and consultants then divide the week's thrust into five episodes by meeting at least twice a week. During these meetings, the Writer's Assistant, like GH's Nathan Fissel, takes notes for the writers, performs research and fact check. The breakdown writers outline an episode, breaking it down into acts and scenes, with a summary of the action. Sometimes a head writer, associate head writer or other members of the crew may choose to write a breakdown. Then the script writers take the breakdown and write dialogue for each scene.
Script Editors, like Elizabeth Korte, Jeff Beldner, and Carolyn Culliton, proof-read each completed script, check for continuity errors, and search for new writers by reading spec scripts. From time to time, a script editor can also write breakdown and dialogue scripts on their respective shows like Korte and Culltion do on General Hospital and One Life to Live. Most primetime TV series, like Desperate Housewives and Medium, have an Executive Story Editor ip=CA&vc=" target="_blank">http://search.yahoo.com/search?p=%22Executive+Story+Editor%22&fr=yfp-t-501&toggle=1&cop=mss&ei=UTF-8&fp_ip=CA&vc= and a Story Editor. A script is not considered completed until the Script Coordinator, like GH's Heidi Ploen, Jim Reitzel, and Sasha Cartullo, goes through it and the head writer gives final approval. A script coordinator is the point person between the writers and production, distributes scripts to production, and takes care of clearance issues.
A television series' writing team can consist of a head writer/co-head writer, associate head writer, breakdown writer, script writer, script/story editor, script/story consultant, script/story coordinator, script supervisor/continuity, creative consultant, and a writer's assistant.
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