Venture Leader - Trade Talent

The Company

1848 Ventures is a venture studio focused on consistently building, launching, and scaling a portfolio of B2B SaaS companies that harness the power of AI to fuel the future of small and medium sized business.

Backed by Westfield®, a respected leader in commercial insurance, 1848 Ventures extends beyond insurance by launching digital products that address the uncertainties that businesses face on a daily basis. We focus on industries that are the driving force of our economy including construction, real estate, hospitality, retail, and restaurants. Westfield’s backing affords us the agility to explore innovative ideas, weather uncertainties, and pursue ambitious ventures with confidence.

Our talented team of hands-on venture builders, data scientists, engineers, and designers combined with repeatable playbooks allows us to rapidly validate, build, launch, and scale customer focused AI enabled startups.

At 1848 Ventures culture is not just a concept – it is the essence of what we do, our behaviors, rituals, and practices. It’s the actions that enable our set of evolving relationships and the experiences they create. The culture is grounded in the practice of virtues. This enables our pursuit of excellence, which we express and measure by our actions. We act on these behaviors in the “how” of our work, our interactions with others, and the conduct we hold ourselves and others accountable to, individually and collectively.

Read on to discover how your skillset and experiences may help contribute to our approach.

The Opportunity

Trade Talent is pre-revenue and is being incubated by 1848 Ventures. Our vision is to become the leading AI-powered recruiting platform that helps busy construction HR teams source, screen, qualify and hire great candidates in hours, not days. Trained on millions of resumes, Trade Talent is perfectly tuned for the construction trades and ensures HR teams can find the best available talent fast with 24/7 candidate sourcing, accurate resume screening, smart candidate matching, automated candidate pre-screening and fast track interview features.

We’re seeking someone with proven experience in launching and growing early-stage SaaS ventures and achieving product market fit to lead the Trade Talent business.

The Trade Talent Venture Leader will be accountable for building upon the initial business model experimentation and derisking work done by the Venture Studio that’s resulted in an MVP ready to launch in the market. In this role, we’ll look to you to hit the ground running, get the product into the market, build a team and develop and execute a Business Plan focused on accelerating customer acquisition and generating a path to sustainable revenue growth and profitability.

Ventures launched and scaled by 1848 Ventures will remain as wholly-owned subsidiaries of Westfield. Success is defined by a combination of long-term strategic and financial value generated for the enterprise. Therefore, the value creation expectations and metrics, while well-defined, differ significantly from those in the traditional capital markets. Our focus on the long term is reflected in our total rewards package for this role which is tied to the performance of Westfield.

In this role time will be divided across, but not limited to, the below responsibilities:

Responsibilities

• Leadership and execution of the activities needed to acquire customers and achieve product market fit. This includes building and iterating on an MVP, setting the product strategy, identifying pricing strategies, getting traction with customers, hiring the team, identifying and experimenting with channel strategies and continually refining based on in-market learnings.
• Works with 1848 Ventures’ leadership to translate high-level strategy and vision into a Business Plan and annual and quarterly objectives and key results with a focus on:
  • Driving customer acquisition and revenue growth
  • Building a path to profitability, and
  • Generating indirect value for our parent company, Westfield.
• Accountable for Trade Talent’s performance including direct and indirect financial outcomes of the business P&L.
• Exemplify the behaviors expressed in our Culture Catchphrases: Care Personally, Challenge Directly, Keep Going, Honor Our Differences, Ask Another Question, and Drive Results.
• Exemplify exceptional people leadership by cultivating the 1848 Ventures culture, providing ongoing coaching and development opportunities, and fostering a supportive environment where individuals thrive through effective communication and strategic guidance.
• Regularly evaluate Trade Talent’s performance to ensure it’s proceeding in the right direction and develop OKRs to evaluate success against the strategy.
• Acts as primary communicator and link between stakeholders, executional team, advisory groups, end users, vendor partners, etc., gaining buy-in on all major strategies and decisions.
• Ensures entire team maintains cohesive vision despite the flexible and often fast-paced nature of a start-up environment to optimize business performance.
• Ensures adherences to legal and regulatory standards for data privacy and customer information protection, while also overseeing and enforcing industry-specific business decisions and practices.
  
  

Qualifications

• Previous experience leading an early-stage SaaS company from early traction to $1M+ ARR and product market fit
• Prior experience working in or delivering software solutions in a B2B and/or HRTech context
• Developed, executed and iterated a growth plan informed by in market learnings
• Built early-stage teams optimized for flexibility and growth in digital, data driven companies
• Proven track record in outstanding people leadership, demonstrated through the cultivation of teamwork, establishment of a supportive environment, and dedication to coaching and developing individuals to realize their full potential. Proficient in effective communication and strategic guidance to achieve organizational goals
• Experience working at the forefront of an emerging business trend driven by new technologies or a shift in customer preferences (E.g., product powered by machine learning/AI) 
• Collaborative, results-driven critical thinker capable of leading development and refinement of the new venture based on deep customer insights 
• Previous venture leadership experience partnering and sharing accountability with other influential leaders – technology, product – to develop direction, formulate plans, and drive results to achieve product-market fit and scale an early-stage venture
• Ability to analyze the strengths and weaknesses of various business model decisions including go-to-market strategies and pricing models and create financial projections to support the decisions
• Metrics driven day-to-day operational leadership including building and monitoring OKRs to evaluate success against the strategy
• Demonstrated ability to grow and maintain a team; to create and manage a culture of collaboration and high performance; to influence without authority; to rally a team around a compelling vision
• Evidence of applied thought leadership to take a unique business model through its next generation of iteration and development
• Accountability for and management of P&L for a business, cash flow for a company, and ability to illustrate and explain variances
• Proven ability to successfully communicate across a variety of diverse stakeholders (team, board of directors, advisory groups, customers, vendor partners, etc.) via both detailed written and verbal communications

Nice-to-haves

• Experience working with products that are powered by machine learning/AI
• Experience designing and implementing a go-to-market strategy where the usage and advancement of the product's features is the most influential driver of the venture's growth

Travel

This position is remote or hybrid depending on the candidate’s location and proximity to 1848 Ventures’ Headquarters located outside of Cleveland, Ohio. Expectations are that our Venture Leaders are available to engage with 1848 Ventures’ and Westfield’s leaders in the office, as needed. Additionally, whether remote or hybrid, Venture Leaders will travel when and where necessary based on varying business needs and opportunities to meet with their team for customer discovery, customer engagement, team development, relationship-building, and networking initiatives.

Our hybrid culture is intentional and well-rounded – we select the right time, place, and technology combination to help achieve our goals. We are comfortable working across time zones and work locations. Remote Venture Leaders should expect 33% travel. Venture Leaders who reside within a commutable distance to Westfield Center, Ohio should expect to work from the office at least 3 days per week.

We are an equal opportunity employer/minority/female/disability/protected veteran.