Transfer window ?

Harding, with Ron Burgundy's tash

It's going to be a testing Movember for BBC Director of News, James Harding. Three key posts need to be filled - Head of Newsgathering, Managing Editor and Business Editor. So far, the only outsider hired for the division has been Ian Katz, from The Guardian.

There's still not much buzz about the fields: Harding is known to admire the work of Laura Kuennssberg, now Business Editor at ITV (though she seemed more at ease on the daily political beat). In theory, the BBC job is graded Band 10, though an "S" at the end means there's free rein to pay above the £67k roof.

Also at ITV is Jonathan Munro, the deputy Editor passed over for the top job when Deborah Turness moved to NBC earlier this year. Would he be interested in a mere Managing Editorship ?

The newsgathering post has significant on-air impact - choosing the next generation of star correspondents (when will John Simpson hang up his burqa?) and reporters, setting styles of story telling (perhaps reducing meaningless hand-wringing), and deciding which stories to "go large" on, with much-diminished budgets. Harding will want to sharpen newsgathering's reactions; is there a Fleet Street friend with the right skill set ?