Goncalo, Jan and Chris

General Manager, ParticleOne

Canada (Remote)

ParticleOne uses science to create safe spaces, complete with healthy air and designed to limit the spread of infectious disease.

We’re looking for a passionate General Manager to lead our team.

ParticleOne is a part of RWDI Ventures, a startup studio from a global engineering firm that is the industry leader in building science and climate engineering. We have already secured a strong SaaS revenue base from a set of globally recognized clients who are using our software to make operational decisions to keep their businesses running and people protected. Our mission, however, is far bigger than COVID-19. ParticleOne is building the technology stack needed to help organizations manage the risk of all infectious diseases for their people, supply chains, and operations.

Your role

You will be the operational leader of ParticleOne, bridging the key functions across the entire business: sales & marketing, R&D, product development, and operations. The Managers and Directors leading these functional areas will form the ParticleOne management team that you will lead and you will report to the CEO of the company. Your primary responsibilities will fall into 4 areas:

  • Strategy Creation & Alignment — You will organize the efforts to develop the strategies to carry ParticleOne into the post-COVID era. You will do this in a bidirectional manner, coordinating and communicating both with the CEO/Board, as well as with the operational management team. This responsibility will demonstrate your unique ability to bridge both high-level corporate strategy, and the operational aspects of implementing these plans. A key area we will lean on you is in developing and scoping our product strategy. You’ll be encouraged to roll up your sleeves and dive into the market, meeting with customers and stakeholders, to get a read on the market conditions in order to enable you to advise on the product direction. Once the strategy is determined, you’ll be the champion, ensure it is communicated, understood, and acted upon throughout the company.
  • Program Coordination — You will have the widest view of the company’s operations, and will coordinate delivery of key company programs (new partnerships, new markets, new releases, etc.). You’ll be responsible for ensuring we have a well-orchestrated response across all aspects of the company, and that we’re viewing the full spectrum of risks and opportunities.
  • Management Team and Stakeholders — The Managers and Directors of the functional areas will report into you, and it will be up to you to build, nurture, and grow that leadership team. You will also be the key contact point for company shareholders and attend many Board meetings as the management representative. 
  • External Leadership — The GM and CEO will be the external “face” of ParticleOne, acting as the spokesperson for media, key contact point in strategic partnerships, and the executive who is ultimately accountable in moments of adversity.               

While the above focus areas will ask you to think and act strategically, ParticleOne is still a small team, and you’ll be relied on to roll up your sleeves and act as a player-coach, be it in assisting on a key sales opportunity, helping scope the product features, develop market messaging, or handling key partner negotiations.

You will be responsible for developing the budget and tracking financial performance across the entire company.

Your work style

ParticleOne is not for everybody. We are looking for a specific type of entrepreneurial leader. You’re not “just” a GM. You’re a true entrepreneur that can lend a hand wherever the fires are burning and you enjoy learning on-the-fly.

You’re passionate about building a company that truly is helping to solve a massively important problem.

While ParticleOne has enjoyed strong initial growth and won key clients, it is still very much a startup in other ways. You’re comfortable with the early stages of a startup that are often messy and changing quickly. You also know that high-growth startups aren’t a place for people that don’t enjoy digging in on tactical challenges. While you are a strategic thinker and team builder, you’re also willing to “sit on the floor” and do the grunt work that exists in every startup.

ParticleOne is well supported by a team of advisors and Board members who have a deep understanding of the business. It is very much an operational Board and you will have them available to assist where required or simply act as a sounding board on strategy or decisions. You excel in environments where you have autonomy, but know how to ask for help when needed.

You’re someone who enjoys and thrives in connecting the dots in complex and changing markets and to develop new strategies. You are comfortable being the vocal and inspiring champion that can carry these strategies through the organization.

The ParticleOne team is remotely based across Canada and the United States. A key quality of yours will be the ability to work with, and lead, a team from a remote setting.

Your past experience

We’re a team that is obsessed with learning, but there are some things that we hope you’ve already experienced in past roles and you will bring that wisdom to the team.

  • You have a track-record of leading (as GM, CEO, or a senior executive), a high-growth startup
  • You have experience in a leadership team building and scaling organizations with revenue of at least $5M/year.
  • You have direct experience managing a product roadmap, and doing the market discovery activities required to guide a product strategy.
  • Experience recruiting and building executive teams, and have experience leading a group of 5+ senior managers or directors.
  • You have experience managing a team budget and P&L.
  • Experience working with and managing a Board and group of external investors
  • Have a working knowledge of finance, sales, operations, and product development functions.
  • An ability to understand complex scientific topics at an undergraduate University level

You have a Bachelor degree, but we are open-minded to the discipline, so long as you exhibit a natural understanding of both science and the customer.

You will often be pulled on to present to the management team or the Board, and you will be a natural communicator who can make complex topics simple, and articulate asks to the organization in a clear manner.

Thank you in advance for your application. Only candidates selected for an interview will be contacted.

A competitive total compensation package is available.

Apply now

Salary commensurate with experience. RWDI and ParticleOne endorses and practices the principles of equal opportunity employment. We are committed to diversity and inclusion. Accommodations are available during all stages of the recruitment process in accordance with AODA and the Human Rights Code.

Nehal Kanetkar

The Ventures team has an awesome blend of people who can get work done while also being respectful, open and honest. It’s a great combination and one that I think makes us very successful.

Nehal Kanetkar, Software Developer, RWDI Ventures