# Strategic Project Lead \(Demand Side\) - Company: [Clera]() - Location: San Francisco - Team: Engineering - Employment type: Full Time - Posted: August 26, 2026 ## Job description ### About the Role This is a high-ownership, commercially focused role at a pre-seed AI-powered talent marketplace, sitting at the intersection of growth, strategy, and client success. You will own the entire demand side of the marketplace — identifying, acquiring, and activating the companies that hire through the platform — and work directly alongside the founding team to turn early traction into a repeatable growth engine. The role is explicitly designed as a launchpad toward a broader General Manager position. ### What You'll Do * Own company acquisition end to end — from prospecting and first outreach through onboarding and client activation. * Build trusted relationships with founders, executives, and talent leaders at high-growth startups. * Develop a deep understanding of each client's hiring needs and translate them into successful searches on the platform. * Execute across multichannel GTM motions including outbound, referrals, partnerships, events, and content. * Personally write and run cold email and LinkedIn outreach sequences, and cold call prospective clients. * Rapidly experiment with new messaging, channels, customer segments, and commercial models. * Turn successful experiments into documented, measurable, and repeatable processes the business can scale. * Collaborate with talent and product teams to improve matching quality, client experience, and marketplace liquidity. * Track the full demand funnel, identify conversion bottlenecks, and take ownership of improving them. ### What We're Looking For * 1–2+ years of experience in a client-facing, commercial, consulting, operations, or growth role. * Background in a fast-paced, high-performance environment such as a venture-backed startup, management consulting, investment banking, or venture capital. * Exceptional written and verbal communication skills, with the ability to craft compelling outreach and establish credibility with senior leaders. * Strong relationship-building instincts and comfort engaging directly with founders and executives. * Willingness to pick up the phone, initiate cold conversations, and maintain momentum through rejection. * Highly analytical and experimental mindset — you design tests, read results, and iterate quickly. * Ability to operate across both strategy and hands-on execution without waiting for detailed instructions. * High ownership, urgency, and genuine ambition to build something meaningful from an early stage. ### Location On-site in San Francisco, CA, United States. Visa sponsorship is not available. ## Apply [Apply on Clera]() Canonical job page: