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Salary: USD 170,000 - 225,000 / annual
Expa is a private design studio that builds and supports a portfolio of companies and projects across software, hardware, hospitality, and more. The studio also runs an early-stage investment fund and cohort program for founders.
You will serve as Operations Manager, treating operations as a product rather than back-office function. This is a self-directed, mid-senior role where you own the operations function end-to-end rather than staffing it. Approximately 60% of your time will focus on the fund and cohort program; 40% supports the broader portfolio.
Key responsibilities include:
- Fund and program operations: Support fundraising operationally, maintain investor tracking and program budgets, manage payment milestones for participating companies.
- Founder support: Help early-stage companies get spun up and hold them accountable to timelines and milestones.
- Financial review and budgeting: Review monthly financials with outside accountants, maintain current budgets across studio and projects, flag variances early, update opex based on trends.
- Insurance: Own insurance end-to-end for new projects and entities—applications, quotes, underwriting, renewals, certificates—working directly with brokers.
- Operating rhythm: Own agendas, inputs, and follow-ups for weekly operations meetings, pipeline reviews, and monthly business reviews.
- Project onboarding/offboarding: Set up new teams with tools, accounts, and administrative support on day one; support clean close-outs.
- Legal coordination: Coordinate between project teams and outside counsel on trademarks, patents, terms, privacy policies, consulting agreements, NDAs.
- Entity and vendor setup: Handle registrations, compliance agents, third-party services across entities and project websites.
- Check-ins and escalation: Meet regularly with project leads, track open threads, surface leadership needs with context.
- First point of contact: Be the default person teams approach for answers or direction.
- Events and programming: Plan and run events and professional development programming.
You will work in a small team environment where you set priorities, make most decisions independently, and exercise judgment about which decisions to make and move on, which to make and report, and which to escalate first.
Requirements:
- 4–8+ years of experience in operations, chief of staff, or program management roles, with meaningful time inside a venture fund, private equity firm, accelerator, or startup. Experience quality matters more than years—judgment to move things forward without direction is key.
- Independent operator who runs your own function without needing a queue; comfortable deciding when nobody else will.
- Strong judgment about decision-making hierarchy: knowing when to decide and move on, decide and report, or escalate first.
- Thrives in ambiguity; comfortable starting before processes exist, writing manuals, and rewriting them as portfolio changes.
- Financial fluency: read monthly P&Ls, hold accountants to close calendars, build and maintain budgets, spot anomalies.
- Fund and entity administration: comfort with entity setup, insurance, registrations, working with outside counsel and accountants.
- Instinct for others' blind spots; notice what will be missed and raise it early.
- Tech savvy and fluent in macOS and Google Suite (Calendar, Drive, Sheets, Docs).
- Trustworthy and discreet; clear understanding of confidentiality.
- Professional and personable with excellent verbal communication and ability to build relationships across diverse teams.
