Many journalists reach a fork in the road where they have to decide whether to press on as a reporter or to start along the route of becoming an editor. (As you know, a fork has more than two prongs and there is another option: to just get the hell out of this ever-changing, always demanding profession.) Long ago I chose the editor route but with a nice side order of reporting whenever it made sense. For this month’s issue, for example, I dispatched myself to the Mipim property trade fair in Cannes. Early on in my career I saw how much fun and influence editors had and also how the good ones both played to their strengths and acknowledged their own weaknesses. There’s nothing worse than an editor who always thinks that they are the best person for any reporting mission: assigning is the watchword.

As in most businesses, there’s a clear hierarchy at magazines, Monocle included. While Tyler is clearly the admiral of the fleet, my fancy position as editor in chief comes, at least, with some imaginary epaulettes and a jaunty hat. But when we are putting together an issue, it’s all about working as a team, listening to different perspectives, commissioning the best journalists and photographers, writing and rewriting headlines and fine-tuning the pace and rhythm of the magazine.

To be a part of all of these decisions is why someone chooses to be an editor. Of course, Matt, our photography director, knows more about his domain than I do but, after years spent working together, he’ll hear me out if I think that the “select” from a shoot needs to change. Lewis, our rarely riled chief sub editor, will let me amend headlines and help nudge a story one way or the other in a final edit – though I would never do battle with him on rules of grammar. As we approach the deadline for sending an issue to press, hundreds of small choices are made at pace and hopefully we steer everything to a good place.

Then, on the day that the magazine heads to the printers, editors and the leads in the commercial team gather for what we call “the flip”. On a large TV screen, we get to see a digital version of how the magazine will look with the ads now in place. It’s a final chance to check whether there are any strange adjacencies – whether an image on an advert too closely matches the one on the editorial page that it’s next to. And then it’s over to the production team and the editors have to sit back (or, rather, start another issue). After about 10 days, we get the first boxes from the printers and discover whether our ideas, decisions and conversations have delivered what we hoped for.

In this issue you’ll find our Design Awards, organised by that section’s editor (and committed writer), Nic Monisse. There’s an interview with Femke Halsema, the mayor of Amsterdam, commissioned by our foreign editor, Alexis Self, that dives into debates about legalising drugs, sex work and over-tourism. There’s also a look at the future of the grocery shop, co-ordinated and corralled by executive editor Christopher Lord. Our fashion director, Natalie Theodosi, has commissioned a feature that looks at why couture houses are heading to the Chanakya School of Craft in Mumbai. And there’s an epic Expo that seems to have involved just about everyone, looking at places of contemplation and their role in these harried times.

All are the outcome of numerous editorial meetings, story-list finessing by Josh, art direction by Rich and a-second-to-decide moments at the printers by Jackie. It’s the work of a group of people who see in magazines the chance to tell a story, to find the harmony between words and pictures, and to engage, entertain and inform you, our reader.