Be the first BD person (besides our founder) at Job Portraits. Work at the intersection of journalism, startups, and recruiting.
Note: As of December 2018 we are no longer actively hiring for this position. That said, if you like what you read, feel free to drop us a note! We’re always open to conversations with people who dig what we’re doing.
Basics: We’re based in San Francisco but our team is remote-first and we work flexible hours. Because you’ll need to be able to visit Bay Area clients regularly, we are looking for someone local for this role. Compensation for this position is $80–160K. We pay 100% benefit premiums for health, dental, vision, and life.
Job Portraits is at a key inflection point. Last year we grew revenue 3.5X and bootstrapped to profitability, entirely through inbound BD and word-of-mouth. We provided high-touch creative services to recruiting teams at startups and VCs. Now we want to use our learnings to streamline our services and access a much larger segment of the startup market. In order to do this, we need a BD person who understands the people/recruiting function and is excited to work in a small-company environment.
We approach BD as a client-experience challenge at the foundation of our business. Because our services are collaborative, success turns on the tone and expectations we set during the BD process. We listen closely. We empathize. This is as far from transactional sales as it gets.
At root we fix a knowledge-gap problem: companies with strong, healthy work culture hire better people faster — but only if job candidates know about that culture. Using the tools of journalism, we help companies market their job opportunities with blog posts, photos, videos, and social campaigns. We often pair this content creation with brand development, employee engagement programs, and D&I consulting. On the flip side, we run a publication that helps job seekers make better decisions about where to work. (And, ahem, here’s a peek at our work culture ;))
On the surface we look like an agency, but under the hood we have broader ambitions — to widen access to meaningful work (our mission), to shape the norms of work itself, and to build our own business as a model for healthy, empowering work culture.
As our first BD hire you’ll play an essential role in making this future real. You’ll work alongside our cofounder, Miki, who has been nurturing, closing, and managing client relationships since our founding. In a sentence, you’ll bring startups to our services, note your learnings as you close new deals, and distribute insights to shape the direction of the business. Your work will include taking action at every stage of the BD funnel: demand-generation, qualification, closing, and collaboration with our creative team. For reference, we’ve modeled this role on the concept of the “early business hire” described here.
Psst! We wrote this for you: “Researching Job Portraits? Here’s everything you need to know in one place.”
You’ll knit together the needs of prospective clients with the abilities of our team. You’ll think on your feet and decide what’s possible, what isn’t, and follow through. You’ll seamlessly flow between pitch meetings with clients, tactical planning with our creative team, and service-design sessions with Miki and others. How will it feel? Your responsibility will be to close deals, but, deep inside, you’ll thrive on the satisfaction of getting the right people in the room and setting the conditions for them to succeed.
We’ve already laid the foundation: we’re a tight-knit, people-first team with a strong reputation. This is an opportunity for a many-hat-wearing, collaborative seller pining to work in a creative environment. Reach out to us, and come help us shape the future of work.
Resonate? Apply here in fewer than 5 minutes. Or ask Jackson anything (he’s our cofounder with the cardboard arms, below): jackson at jobportraits dot com.
A final note: We believe our success is dependent on our ability to build a team that represents a wide diversity of backgrounds, experiences, and viewpoints. A deep-seated curiosity about people is a value that unites our team. In fact, our bottom line depends on our desire and ability to have meaningful conversations and build trusting relationships with people who are different from us. We welcome everyone who is passionate about our mission and feels they can contribute to our work, and we especially encourage candidates from underrepresented groups to apply.
H/T to our friends at Tradecraft for inspiring the contours of this position and Lever for the writing inspiration.
