Founder Relations Associate

Pairs; United States; Remote; USD 80,000 - 130,000; Full time

Benefits offered by this job

Fully remote role

Direct access to co-founders

Commission-based compensation

Job summary

Pairs is hiring a Founder Relations Associate to be the first point of contact for founders engaging with us. You will assess their raise, map interest, and determine if Pairs is the right next step, guiding discussions on calls and demos.

You will work directly with the two co-founders and our closing team, building trust with founders across the US, Europe and the Middle East, and ensuring promises align with what we deliver.

Qualifications

• Experience working directly with founders (accelerators, VC platforms, startups or founder-facing commercial roles).
• Proven ability to convert conversations into commitments without overpromising outcomes.
• Familiarity with how a raise works (stages, rounds, lead investors).
• Comfort building trust across markets and backgrounds, and using AI judiciously.

Responsibilities

• Conduct initial founder conversations to inform and qualify next steps.
• Capture founder traction, runway, investor interest and blockers for the team.
• Schedule the next steps and provide context for the following team member.
• Maintain warm relationships with founders not yet ready for engagement.

Skills

Founders relationships

Deal flow

Sales to founders

AI tools

Tools

CRM tools

Job description

We are hiring a Founder Relations Associate to be the first person founders speak to at Pairs, and to help the right ones start working with us.

Pairs is a global network of family offices, institutional investors, VCs and angels. We screen deal flow very tightly, and the opportunities that clear our diligence go out to the network. We invest alongside them too.

THE ROLE

Founders who are raising hear a lot of pitches. Yours is the conversation that earns their trust, because it is about their raise, not about us.

On the first call, you learn where the company is, how much it is raising, who is already interested and what has stalled. Then you decide, with them, whether Pairs is the right next step.

When it is, you walk them through how we work and what it costs, and book the next conversation on the call. When it is not, you tell them so, and stay in touch until the timing is right.

Some founders are better served by our platform tier. For them, you run the demo and close it yourself.

We work with founders across the US, Europe and the Middle East. The expectations you set are the ones we deliver against, so you only promise what we do.

You will work directly with the two co-founders and our closing team. The organisation is flat, so you will see first-hand how we screen companies, what we decline and why.

WHAT YOU WILL OWN

• First conversations. A call that leaves every founder better informed about their raise, whether or not they work with us.

• The founder's picture. Round, traction, runway, investor interest and the real blocker, captured clearly for the team.

• The next step. Booked on the call, with the context the next person needs.

• Founder relationships. The founders who are not ready yet, kept warm until they are.

YOU ARE A FIT IF YOU

• Have worked closely with founders: at an accelerator, a VC platform team, a startup, or in a founder-facing commercial role.

• Have turned conversations into commitments, and can walk us through one where the founder was hesitant.

• Understand how a raise works: stage, round structure, lead investors, and why investors pass.

• Set expectations you can stand behind. You never promise an outcome, and you would rather lose a deal than oversell one.

• Build trust quickly with founders from different markets and backgrounds.

• Use AI tools daily, with clear judgement about where they improve your work and where they would compromise its quality.

WHAT WE OFFER

• A fully remote role, with working hours that overlap US Eastern time, where most of our founders are

• Direct access to the co-founders and our closing team

• Close collaboration with our internal team

• A sales process that already works, and recorded calls to learn it from

• Insight into how we screen companies and match them with investors

• A base salary plus commission