Venture Lead
PSL is a startup studio and early-stage venture capital fund focused on the next generation of software and service companies based in the Pacific Northwest. We develop ideas with exceptional entrepreneurs from scratch and validate or kill them (ruthlessly). For the best ideas, we invest significant development work and capital to turn these ideas into venture-funded companies with rapid customer and market adoption. See a few examples here.After testing hundreds of ideas and creating nearly 40 spinout companies over the past eight years, we have developed a successful, systematic approach for validating, launching, and scaling great ideas.
Our team of pricipals / venture leads, engineers, designers, marketers and operators is obsessed with supporting and accelerating the work of uncommonly talented founders.We are looking for a Venture Lead to come and help us build great companies. You will work rapidly to advance ideas from their utmost nascency to create scaled businesses. As part of the job, you will help define and interrogate the questions that will determine the success or failure of a startup (you’ll focus on the hardest ones first). Most of the time (around 90%) you’ll be the first to tell us why an idea won’t work.
The other 10%, you’ll be the first to tell us why it’s the region’s next billion-dollar business. Along the way, you’ll act as a thought partner and co-builder to the founders we serve and work on a 1:1 basis with a PSL Managing Director. Working in conjunction with the rest of the PSL Core team, you’ll act as the Swiss Army knife “dream cofounder.” You’ll talk to hundreds of customers and synthesize insights, develop and refine the business model, run digital marketing campaigns to test market pull, and develop company narratives and work with product teams to build early MVPs that can gain market traction. In addition to your work on the Studio side of our business, you will also lean in on our venture fund to conduct diligence for investment decisions, identify and surface deals that you are excited about, and help drive the investment process. You are curious, optimistic yet discerning, and highly autonomous. You absolutely love startups.
Roles and Responsibilities:
- Identify and evaluate potential spinouts and new technologies using financial models and market research
- Work with founders and entrepreneurs-in-residence to drive their success and identify and help establish product market fit
- Serve as a thought partner and “do-er” alongside a PSL Managing Director
- Build relationships with entrepreneurs and other industry professionals
- Expertise in storytelling through presentations and communications materials
- Assist in Studio and Fund operations, which includes drafting quarterly reports and developing materials for annual meetings
- Serve as a strategic advisor to portfolio companies as needs arise
As our New Venture Lead, a typical day might include the following . . .
- Act as the “pre-CEO” of a business, catalyzing it from just an idea into a plan for validation
- Execute demand-gen programs and run customer interviews to get a deep understanding of the problem(s) to be solved
- Develop competitive landscapes and create clear “unique competitive advantages” (product, GTM, pricing…)
- Collaborate with an amazing multi-disciplinary team of developers, designers, growth marketers, data scientists to craft new MVP products
- Prepare customer narratives (marketing) and investor decks to communicate new ideas to various stakeholders
- Set the foundation of operating plans and financial models as new companies are formed
- Develop and articulate TAM and trends that suggest very large markets
- Develop target lists and engage with potential VC investors for new ventures
- Act as a project manager while transitioning a project to the founder(s), setting them up with a comprehensive foundation for success (documents, systems, vendors…)
- Aligning and engaging the PSL team to coordinate resources and decisions
- Partnering closely with a founder on whatever problem is keeping you both up at night
- Owning and driving the schedules of key deliverables/milestones to create a venture-scale company
- Engage deeply with the startup community to recruit founders or early team members
- Improve the overall systems, tools, and content of the PSL Studio, pushing for continuous improvement
Signs this might be a fit
- You’ve founded your own company and know what it takes
- You owned and launched a winning product at or for a tech company
- You’ve been building technical side projects while doing your day job
- You’re a proven analyst with a keen ability to translate your findings into a narrative
- You have strong UX, prototyping, customer research, growth, branding or tech chops
- You enjoy thinking in processes, and frameworks and using repetition to improve them
- You worked in an early-stage startup or development agency in a product leadership role
- You’ve run growth to efficiently acquire customers at an early-stage company
- Have seen a product through to product/market fit and customer traction
- You have a thought leader and have community presence online
- You appreciate and ascribe to the PSL values
Preferred Skills and Qualifications:
- Comfort with ambiguity and risk
- Strong financial analysis and financial modeling skills
- Ability to work well in a team and think creatively and strategically
- Experience in product management or startups
- Technical knowledge in a particular industry
- Business strategy experience
- Self-motivated team-player with a relentlessly positive attitude and instinct to respond to team needs
- Organized and detail-oriented project manager who can stay on top of complex projects
- Articulate and thoughtful communicator that can turn complex ideas into easy to digest deliverables, presentations, content, and communications
- Relationship builder with a strong, low-ego working style that can collaborate and support across all levels of an organization
The salary range for this position is $145,000-$180,000 Annually. Please note that the base salary range is a guideline, and individual total compensation will vary based on factors such as the candidate's relevant experience, qualifications, education, skill level, competencies and work location. In addition, this position is eligible for an equity grant.PSL provides the following benefit for regular, full time employees:
- Medical, dental, vision, EAP and life insurance. Employee premiums are covered at 100% and dependent premiums are covered at 75%
- Long and Short term disability coverage fully paid for by PSL
- Self Managed paid time off
- Commuter benefit of either a fully subsidized ORCA pass or a parking spot (value up to $315/month)
- Once weekly lunch delivery
- Two volunteer days off to dedicate to a cause important to you
- Professional development allowance up to $1500 annually
We are an equal opportunity employer and highly value diversity at our company. We do not discriminate on the basis of race, religion, color, national origin, gender, sexual orientation, age, marital status, veteran status, or disability status.
