Entrepreneur First was founded in 2011 by Alice Bentinck and Matt Clifford with the aim of enabling the world’s most ambitious people to build the most important companies, and that is still true today. We are the world’s leading talent investor – we invest time and money in outstanding individuals, helping them find a co-founder, develop an idea, and start a technology company from scratch.
Across our programmes in Europe and Asia, to date we have helped over 2000 individuals build more than 230 companies, with a total valuation of $1.5 billion. EF’s companies have been funded by many of the leading venture investors in Europe, Asia and Silicon Valley. Our major exits to date include Magic Pony Technology which was acquired by Twitter for a reported $150m only 18 months after the Founders met on the EF programme.
EF itself is backed by some of the world’s best investors, including the founders of LinkedIn, DeepMind and PayPal, and runs cohorts in London, Singapore, Hong Kong, Berlin, Paris and Bangalore.
The Role
Talent, which means identifying and engaging high potential founders, is at the heart of EF. We are on the lookout for an Associate who will play a vital role in making Entrepreneur First the default preference for the most ambitious individuals in India. As a Talent Associate, your primary responsibility is to engage smart, talented individuals with strong founder potential and encourage them to start companies. For the highest-potential individuals we identify, you’ll be their first point of contact from the initial coffee meeting to their interview, offer, and the start of their programme.
This role sits within our Talent function and you will have the opportunity to help us shape our Talent strategy going forward. You’ll work closely with our Global Talent team and local company-building teams, and this is a role with lots of autonomy and self-direction day-to-day. There are several possible growth opportunities which stem from taking on this role – EF is growing rapidly in India and as we scale, new functions and roles with lots of responsibility are created.
Responsibilities
1. Engagement – You will need to identify, source and curate the best people and build relationships with these high potential individuals. It will be your mission to get them to think of EF as a valid career path. This will be done through various methods – direct messaging, using connections and referrals of alum, holding large events etc – and you will have a lot of autonomy to try new and innovative methods. Sometimes this can also mean going to them (we often find ourselves drinking lots of coffee at university campuses or jumping on planes for a week of meetings). You’ll also be a regular contributor to the content EF produces, which helps engage specific communities of interest (and build on your personal brand).
2. Conversion – We currently ‘convert’ people to apply to EF through face-to-face meetings and invitations to exclusive events. It will be your responsibility to increase our conversion rate by meeting the best people face to face and building long-lasting relationships with them. The most interesting individuals are usually highly sought after talent, have many options at hand, and have lots of questions about EF. They require special attention and having you on the team means we can give it to them. Across our 6 month recruitment period, we would expect to see around half of your positive engagements turn into applicants. In line with our data-driven approach to talent acquisition, you’ll also help us set up a system to track our interactions and measure effectiveness of different types of engagement.
3. Data-driven cultivation – Your role would also involve longer term cultivation of leads that don’t immediately convert. The overall Talent process, including the long term lead management, would need to be done in an organized, and data-driven way. You will also have autonomy to experiment with and set up the cultivation process which if most effective for cultivating and converting these leads in the long run.
4. Partnerships – You will identify and reach out to potential partners in the ecosystem and run different initiatives to build awareness for Entrepreneur First and create a path for ambitious founders to reach out to us.
5. Support company-building – You will also spend time with founders once they have started the program, play the role of their confidante and support them closely as they progress through the difficult journey of entrepreneurship. This will be a great opportunity to closely observe highly skilled founders in action and be involved with early stage startups from the beginning.
Key Skills Required
- A drive for results with a focused approach to constantly track performance against targets.
- Strong pipeline management skills with the ability to track, evaluate and pull levers at different stages. The best experience for this would be if you have spent time in sales or business development in a high growth organization.
- An analytical approach and comfort with numbers – proven analytical and data management skills.
- Excellent interpersonal skills – ability to hold engaging conversations, convince people and also address large audiences.
- Ability to create and manage lasting relationships
Bonus points for:
- Experience planning and executing large events
- Experience with digital marketing and content writing
- Tech ecosystem insights – knowledge and/or connects with the top institutes and big players in the tech ecosystem in India
- Startup experience – either as founder or early employee
You’ll also get to:
- Surround yourself with the world’s smartest and most ambitious individuals and have the opportunity to be an early employee at an institution that is changing the way the most ambitious people approach entrepreneurship in India. The potential impact is enormous.
- Supercharge your learning – you’ll have a very steep learning curve and work in a talented, ambitious, and committed team of specialists.
- Embed yourself within the EF network – we work with the best technologists, founders, investors and high net worth individuals.
Minimum Experience
A minimum of 4 years of work experience is required.
Location
You’ll be based at our Bangalore office in HSR Layout.
Start Date and Commitment
Start as soon as possible. This is a full time role.
If interested, please apply here.
