Principal Product Operations Manager, Gusto
Benefits
$148-217k
Actual salary range is dependent on location. Offers equity (RSUs)
2-3 days a week in office
Automated payroll, benefits & HR platform
Be an early applicant
Automated payroll, benefits & HR platform
1001+ employees
Be an early applicant
$148-217k
Actual salary range is dependent on location. Offers equity (RSUs)
2-3 days a week in office
1001+ employees
Company mission
To grow the small business economy.
Role
Who you are
- 10+ years of relevant work experience at growing startups in operating roles (i.e., biz ops/strategy roles, product operations, project/program management, and/or consulting):
- Experience scaling service strategy alongside growing SaaS products, including incubating products, building and managing product betas, and/or integrating new products into a scalable best-in-class service model
- Highly adaptable and resilient to changes in business needs or requirements, with the ability to navigate challenges and make decisions even when information is incomplete
- Demonstrated self-starter and organized problem-solver. Self-sufficient, resourceful, and bias for action towards continuous improvement
- Experienced with managing a variety of cross-functional stakeholders on complex strategic initiatives, including influencing senior leaders in Product or Customer Experience orgs
- Strong data literacy and results-orientation, with the ability to identify the right questions, interpret quantitative and qualitative signals, and translate findings into decisions — including comfort using AI-assisted tools for analysis and synthesis
- Excellent written and verbal communication skills, with the ability to effectively communicate complex subjects to both technical and non-technical audiences
- Demonstrated AI fluency in an operational and product context — comfort using AI tools to synthesize qualitative data, identify automation opportunities in service workflows, and building or directing AI agents to reduce manual operational lift:
- Experience prototyping with AI (e.g., Claude, Cursor, Codex or similar) is a plus
- Experience with service design and/or service blueprinting
- Experience working in the healthcare or benefits space (PEO, health insurance, etc.) is a plus; candidates with new product incubation experience in any complex regulated space are strongly encouraged to apply
What the job involves
- Gusto is looking for a strategic, customer-focused leader to leverage customer feedback and operational key metrics to develop actionable insights and strategies that shape our product and service, and positively impact customer love
- Working with the Product, Engineering, Design and Customer Experience teams, you will be expected to tackle both highly strategic and deeply operational initiatives to deliver value for customers and Gusto. You’ll be customer-obsessed, business-minded, strategic, detail-oriented, and highly creative
- In this role, you'll help stand up the operational and service foundation for a new Gusto product, using both deep human judgment and emerging AI tools to move faster and make better decisions. If this sounds exciting to you, we’d love to connect!
- Shape and support product development and its integration into service strategy for existing customers across the product lifecycle, in collaboration with Engineering, Design, Product Management, and Customer Experience teams
- Understand our product and end-to-end service experience and organizations in intimate detail, including internal and external pain points and feedback. Collaborate to ensure customer support considerations are integrated into broader company decisions
- Lead and partner on product launches between Product Management and Customer Experience (CX) teams to ensure readiness and deliver insights post-launch to ensure a positive experience for customers and internal teams
- Provide business insights and recommendations based on quantitative and qualitative data to influence strategy and operational design in both product and service roadmaps
- Identify and drive cross-functional initiatives that will deliver value for customers and Gusto. Help develop and communicate a clear roadmap for enhancing service capabilities and experiences
- Hypothesis-driven problem solving to drive our business
- Contribute to advancing the Product Operations craft at Gusto and build AI fluency within the team:
- Model how to use AI tools to accelerate service design, insight synthesis, and agent-driven operational workflows
- Identify and build AI-assisted operational workflows, including agents, to accelerate VoC synthesis, launch readiness monitoring, and cross-functional signal aggregation
- Use AI tools to prototype service solutions and surface requirements faster, compressing the feedback loop between customer signal and product/service response — before full engineering investment
Our take
For many small businesses, vital administrative tasks such as payroll, taxes, and benefits are manual tasks that take time and energy which many SMB owners don’t have. The three co-founders of Gusto – all coming from small business backgrounds – collaborated on a Fintech company that would handle employee payments, benefits administration, and compliance support specifically for small businesses.
The company may have started slowly, as the founders focused on nailing each individual aspect of Gusto’s operations, but has now skyrocketed to unicorn status with more than 400,000 customers and a multi-billion dollar valuation. And in 2021, Gusto began acquiring other companies to strengthen its offering and its position in a competitive market, including two other fintech startups, Ardius and Symmetry.
Through its continued acquisitions and fundraising efforts, the company has carved out a strong position for itself in the space. Although Gusto has found itself impacted by the macroeconomic situation, through the significant effect it has had on its clientele, the company still appears positive for the future after raising funds in 2023 that has seen it reach key profitability benchmarks. It continues to expand its platform, most recently partnering with Parafin to launch a payroll line of credit for small businesses. With a growing suite of services and a clear focus on supporting small businesses through changing economic conditions, Gusto looks set to sustain its momentum and further strengthen its position in the HR and payroll technology market.
Steph
Company Specialist at Welcome to the Jungle
Insights
45% employee growth in 12 months
Company
Funding (last 2 of 9 rounds)
May 2022
$55m
SERIES E
Aug 2021
$175m
SERIES E
Total funding: $706.3m
Company benefits
- Health and Wellbeing: Medical, dental, and vision insurance for employees and dependents. Family care and support, including family planning and fertility benefits. Gender-affirming care and support. A variety of mental health resources.
- Time Away: It's important to take time away for yourself or to take care of your family. Gusto offers paid vacation, sick time, bereavement, and holidays, paid leaves, sabbatical, and more!
- Free meals and refreshments: If you work at one of our offices, enjoy food, drinks, and snacks— on us. Conversation and community is an added bonus!
- Perks:
Company HQ
Central Waterfront, San Francisco, CA
Leadership
Joshua Reeves
(Co-Founder & CEO)Studied Electrical Engineering at Stanford and went onto co-found Gusto in 2011.
Tomer London
(Co-Founder & CPO)Has a PhD in Electrical Engineering from Stanford. Was a Researcher at Intel, and then interned at Bump Technologies. Co-founded Vizmo, a mobile self-service technologies company, in 2008. Co-founded Gusto in 2011.
Edward Kim
(Co-Founder & Head of Engineering)Studied Electrical Engineering at Stanford. Was Senior Project Engineer at Volkswagen of America Electronics Research Lab and then co-founded Picwing, a printed photos company, in 2008. Co-founded Gusto in 2011.
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