It’s an oversimplification worth heeding: Journalists should never be in charge of anything. Don’t ever say to a columnist, “If you’re so smart, why don’t you do something other than criticize?” Too risky. We can organize words, sentences and paragraphs into an article. Beyond that, we struggle to organize a BLT sandwich.
Kidding, mainly, but there is a grain of truth in the above. Often, one of the worst things you can do to a gifted journalist is to turn him or her into an editor.
For decades, however, that was the only way for good writers to get better pay and promotion.