Venture Studio Lead Germany (Contract)
Berlin
Factory – Product /
Contract /
Hybrid
👋 Hey, We're Founders Factory
About Founders Factory:
Founders Factory builds and funds startups alongside exceptional entrepreneurs and the world's leading companies. Created by IPO-exited founders and headquartered in London, Founders Factory offers founders capital, operational support from a team of 100 hands-on experts, and unrivalled access to a coalition of industry leading corporate partners.
Founders Factory's Venture Studio co-founds businesses from their inception. We develop new ideas, technologies and business models with the ambition of turning them into high growth companies.
Operating sector-focused Accelerator programmes and Venture Funds for Pre-Seed and Seed stage startups, Founders Factory invests in talented and diverse founding teams across industries and geographies - with a current focus on FinTech, Health, Climate, Media & Telecoms, Consumer and Web3.
Since 2015, Founders Factory's 300 portfolio companies have raised $900mm follow-on funding from leading funds and investors.
The Opportunity:
As we expand into Germany we are looking to bring on a Studio Lead. You will have the unique opportunity to work across 2 of our Studio ventures as the co-founder to our incoming EIR’s.
You will need to be able to inspire top founders as well as support them in the capacity of a co-founder while dealing with immense uncertainty and diverse challenges.
Please note this role is for a 9 month contract with the potential to develop into longer term. German language skills (fluency) are a must!
🎯 As the Studio Lead, your role will be:
- A "Pre-founder" of our ventures. You will work on identifying the riskiest hypothesis as well as any key work streams that will support founder hiring
- Ensures the squad is functioning well, venture has well documented actions and team are aligned and working effectively
- Drive outcomes and focus for the venture with a big focus on user validation to de-risk hypotheses around value, feasibility, viability and usability
- Ownership and accountability for the key decisions during build, and ability to report venture progress to corporate investors and the FF leadership team as necessary
- The confidence and ability to influence and challenge a founder
- You will be the link between the founder and Founders Factory using your experience to enable the founder to get the most out of the program as well as leveraging the wider teams skills.
🙌 In your day-to-day, you may find yourself doing the following:
- Take an active part and be a key decision maker in hiring the founder.
- Work with studio managers to determine an appropriate core team for venture and take responsibility for onboarding the founder.
- Timeline and budget management, responsible for making sure the venture spins out on time and within budget. Making decisions on budget that best supports the momentum of the venture
- Collaborate with founders to define product roadmaps against KPIs and product goals, responsible for ensuring all work is broken down into clear requirements for the various team members working on a given project.
- Support founders in their own growth – we help guide their decisions and build through all aspects of the product and software development
- You will be closely engaged with all the workings of the new venture and be answerable for its actions. Together with the founders you will help to develop a big vision & mission and guide changes in direction where necessary.
- Act as an advocate for the new venture within Founders Factory and externally. Help the founder to build a team and set them up for success post Studio program.
Previous experience:
- Strong product background with a hands-on approach. You've synced a team, shaped a product and shipped it out as well!
- You have co-founded or led the product team at an early stage startup.
- Expertise in driving product-driven companies forward with a strong business and financial acumen as well as a deep understanding of business fundamentals.
- Ability to work with strategic investors and C-level executives.
- Hiring and retaining a world class team.
- Have a deep networks of founders, venture capital firms and startup talent.
Qualities you need to be successful in this role:
- Have an ability to connect, emphasise and collaborate with top tier founder talent.
- Deals comfortably with the uncertainty of change and complex problems, effectively handles risk and can make a decision with incomplete information.
- Operates effectively, is calm under pressure and productive with multiple plates spinning or when the future is unclear.
- Have a strong bias for action and persists in accomplishing objectives despite setbacks.
- Has an approach to management that involves trusting other people, removing roadblocks.
- Able to understand the perspective of others and evaluate their own thinking whilst looking for feedback and continuously improve.
- Ability to work across geographies, time zones and multi-functional teams.
