He won the regional Senior Journalist of the Year Award at the age of 21 and rose to become assistant chief sub-editor before leaving newspapers to read Law at Sussex University.
Tempted back into newspapers by becoming the first journalist hired in two years at the Daily Mirror in mid 80s at a time when the paper was considered "the mink lined coffin" - so highly regarded and so well paid that no-one ever left.
As chief sub-editor on Today during the late 1980s, he more than coped with a general shortage of trained subs in the industry[1] and aided the achievement of Newspaper of The Year under editorship of David Montgomery.
Under editor Martin Dunn Parsons became Features Editor at Today, which he later described as his most difficult role in Fleet Street, though he managed to outfox most of the paper's competitors, with the exception of a young pop columnist named Piers Morgan, who visited from the adjoining office of The Sun and stood over a video copying machine, refusing to be distracted and preventing Parsons from bagging the exclusive new Wham release for Today exclusively.
He continues to engage with community, providing stories to local media and founding charity regatta on the River Ouse, for which he was named Lewes Man of the Year in 2016.