(FORTUNE Magazine) – To cover powerful women, it helps to have journalistic powerhouses on your team who also happen to be female. Senior writer Patricia Sellers (that's Pattie seated on the right) pulled together our first 50 Most Powerful list in 1998 and has written every installment since. As she did last year, reporter Alynda Wheat (seated on the left), backed by researcher Matthew Schuerman, did the extensive digging that underlies and renews this act. Two talented editors, Beth Fenner and Susan Fraker (standing, with Beth on the left), directed this year's package, which features a remarkable cover story by Betsy Morris on the growing phenomenon--among this select set anyway--of stay-at-home dads. We stumbled onto this fascinating subject during the annual conference FORTUNE hosts to bring these women together. As you'd expect, the main event is a ton of serious business discussion, but at times the talk also turns to nontrivial personal matters, like families. (I'm not saying powerful men never do this; I'm just saying that at every male-dominated networking festival I've attended, it didn't happen.) A heartfelt private dinner discussion on the subject of househusbands led to our asking Betsy to spend months reporting the topic. The result is a compellingly readable piece of social discovery.

The first thing I did upon becoming managing editor of FORTUNE in February 2001 was make Rick Tetzeli my deputy. It was not a hard call. Rick is a brilliant magazine maker, a calm, decisive manager, and a surprisingly agile foosball player for an old dude (he just turned 41). He's also an all-around great guy, someone whom people like and respect and whose judgment inspires confidence. Which is precisely why (except for the foosball part) my bosses Norm Pearlstine and John Huey recently tapped Rick to become the next managing editor of Entertainment Weekly. Since they're making the same call I did 18 months ago, I really can't complain. But we can--and will--miss him.

On the other hand, we won't miss Rick that much--at least not professionally--because FORTUNE's talent bank is deep. Case in point: senior editor Daniel Roth, who is assuming one of Rick's key duties, running our technology coverage. Dan knows tech (see his smart take on Yahoo in the Sept. 30 issue), and he knows storytelling (you may recall his vivid profile of Pat Robertson last spring). In the months ahead you can count on Dan to make sure our veteran cadre of technology writers deliver stories that keep you one step ahead. Start this issue with "Finding a Silver Lining in the Tech Bust," the first in a series examining what it will take to get this depressed but still crucial industry growing again.

Rik Kirkland MANAGING EDITOR