Chief Operating Officer

Wednesday July 18, 2012

Chief Operating Officer

Reports To:                 CEO

Position Type:             Full-time

Location:                     Boston metro area – virtual office

The High Bar provides expertise, training, powerful, web-based tools and a membership community to the foot soldiers in the battle to improve our nation's public school systems—the boards and CEOs of charter public schools. Our primary delivery method is an online platform called BoardOnTrack. BoardOnTrack is sold as an annual “software-as-a-service” membership to the board and the senior staff of a charter school.

The High Bar’s Chief Operating Officer will be responsible for working closely with the CEO to drive the growth, performance, and profitability of the organization. Specifically you will have day-to-day oversight of the finance, sales, marketing, and customer success functions of the company.  In partnership with the CEO, the COO will help lead the company through a process of defining our monthly and quarterly business priorities and will be directly responsible for making sure our team is effectively executing on these priorities and operating as smoothly as possible on a day-to-day basis.

Want to CHANGE THE WORLD and help BUILD AN AMAZING COMPANY?

This could be your chance to take your well-honed skills and get in on the ground floor of a growing software company.  We are looking for a very unique person. Is that you? You’ll be a fit for this role if you have these qualities:

Proven operational expertise and track record with fast-growing technology companies – this experience will help you craft efficient and effective systems to ramp up our execution and scale sales, marketing, and customer engagement, and hone our business analytics.

Ability to thrive in a start-up environment – there will be lots of freedom to be creative, but in addition, you will have to create many things from scratch. You will not have an “ops team”.  We will remain extremely lean until we can hit agreed upon revenue targets to bring on additional talent. You will have to roll up your sleeves and get your hands dirty.

Relentlessness and Composure – drive to do whatever it takes, regardless of circumstances, to achieve results. Ability to remain calm even when faced with the relentlessness of the work and with unexpected challenges.

Digitally savvy – extremely comfortable with technology, trying new tools, and harnessing the power of current tools. You’ll have to learn our application, BoardOnTrack, inside and out. In addition, you’ll use Salesforce, Marketo, Totango, Zen Desk (among others) on a daily basis.

Business-savvy and hyper analytical – interested in being on the front lines of determining and implementing the profitability path of a growing software company.  You’ll have to be a whiz at analyzing, interpreting, communicating, and adjusting strategies to align with what the data tells us. Able to compile and use data to drive business decisions and growth paths. You’ll be the driver of our KPI reporting and you’ll have to partner with our CTO to wrestle the right data out of a whole host of web-based applications.

• Entrepreneurial—excited about the fast-paced, ups and downs and incredible hands-on creative problem solving that comes with being part of a tiny start up team. You’ll have to prove to us you can handle the pressure that comes from building things from scratch.

If this really sounds like you please read on………….

Key Components of the Job

Profitability:  Strategic Direction, Leadership, and Initiative

Partner with the CEO to craft the company’s strategic direction

Assist the CEO in a creating and maintaining a hyper focus on company’s profitability

• Work with CEO to develop attainable, yet aggressive, monthly, quarterly, and annual company wide targets – ensure that the entire team is completely aligned towards these goals.  Provide exceptional leadership and motivation to the team; free CEO up from day-to-day operations.

Business Intelligence

• Take leadership on developing reports that measure and test the validity of our marketing, sales, and customer engagement approaches and accurately forecast revenue.
• Lead the performance management process that measures and evaluates progress against goals. Ensure that the whole team is aligned with the #1 thing that needs to be accomplished each quarter to move the company forward. Ensure that each employee can report at any time what their productivity is and how that compares against goals.
• Define and track the company’s Key Performance Indicators.  Define monthly reporting requirements and oversee the numbers generated – sales, marketing, p&l, quality and delivery metrics, etc.

Sales

• Partner with the CEO and Director of Sales to define and track aggressive monthly, quarterly and annual sales targets
• Partner with the CTO to be the “salesforce ninja” to develop the work flows and reporting we need for rapid scaling in salesforce.com
• Own all operational components of the sales process – including the efficient utilization of salesforce.com, data management/lists, contracts, license agreements, and invoicing, etc.

 

Marketing

• Take the lead on the day-to-day supervision and support of marketing contractors (and eventually manage a full-time marketing direct report) 
• Own all operational components of our marketing efforts – including the efficient utilization of Marketo

Customer Success

Serve as the direct supervisor of the Director of Customer Success

• Help define “success” and develop the scalable systems to ensure the successful engagement, retention and revenue growth of existing customers. Work with the Director of Customer Success to design and implement a seamless, scalable, as-automated-as-possible, process of onboarding, tracking progress of members through the annual member life cycle, with the aim of increasing member engagement month-over-month, and ensuring a high rate of membership renewals.

Operations, Finance, Human Resources, Risk Management

• Partner with the CTO to ensure business operations are effective and efficient
• Manage and direct company operations to meet budget and other financial goals
• Manage day-to-day work with outsourced bookkeeper and outsourced CFO
• Assist in reviewing and analyzing financial reports
• Oversee payroll and benefits administration
• Oversee risk management and legal activities: license and service agreement, contracts, partnership agreements, trademark and service mark issues, and other legal documents

Required Experience/Skills

• At least 10 years of strong operational experience; previously worked in a senior management role, preferably at entrepreneurial, start-up and/or high growth technology organizations
• Proven leadership ability and track record of harnessing the power of a team to set and exceed ambitious goals
• Results oriented: your success and ours will ultimately be measured “by the numbers”
• Highly motivated, ability to work independently and with little supervision, capable of working in a virtual office environment, and motivating others on your virtual team
• Action-oriented, persistent, focused on results and analytical with strong project management skills
• Outstanding oral and written communication, presentation and relationship-building skills
• Bachelor’s degree from an accredited, four-year university, MBA or other advanced degree preferred
• Extensive knowledge of Salesforce.com and Marketo a huge plus

This position represents a tremendous opportunity to help build a dynamic social enterprise driven to deliver results towards a double bottom-line.

Interested candidates should submit a customized cover letter and up-to-date resume. Please tell us WHY this job and WHY you – no form letters please to: resume@reachthehighbar.com