Operations Lead

sunspell; Northern, New York (KY, NY); Hybrid; USD 50,000 - 70,000; Full time

Job summary

Sunspell is seeking an adaptable Operations seat in New York to manage admin and operational work while supporting the Managing Director and Founder across roadmaps, hiring, budgeting, and vendor relations. You will help build scalable processes, keep records clean, and turn recurring tasks into repeatable workflows.

The role is internship/full-time with growth toward broader operations ownership across Sunspell ventures, starting with hands-on execution and strong attention to detail.

Qualifications

• Experience coordinating complex operations and calendars.
• Ability to manage multiple stakeholders and timelines.
• Strong written and verbal communication skills.

Responsibilities

• Keep the pipeline current with owners, stages, last touch, and next steps.
• Help manage designers and collaborators across Sunspell ventures; organize briefs and deadlines.
• Maintain an accurate internal operating system with current data and processes.

Skills

Project coordination

Schedule management

Communication

Vendor management

CRM familiarity

Education

Bachelor's degree

Tools

GSuite

Slack

Job description

Sunspell is a venture lab building companies at the edge of culture, design, and technology. Most studios build one company at a time. We are building the system that builds companies.

We create products from zero, develop the people who can lead them, and turn the lessons from every venture into shared infrastructure through our internal operating system, so each launch makes the next one faster.

The beliefs underneath are simple: taste is the moat, systems compound, ownership beats consensus, and the best work is day-one useful.

the-seat

Start by keeping the machine moving. Grow into running it.

• Operations is not the back office of a lab like this. It is what allows a small team to build and operate several companies at once.
• Our Managing Director currently oversees client management, company and product roadmaps, the design team, hiring, budgets, legal coordination, investor relations, and the operations behind several ventures at once. It is a role built for three people, and we are building out that team. This is one of those seats.
• The first part of the job is deliberately execution-heavy. You will own the administrative and operational work that keeps everything else moving while co-supporting the broader roadmaps alongside the Managing Director. Over time, the goal is to develop you into someone who can own operations across one or several entities inside the Sunspell ecosystem.

what-you-run

Half client-facing. Half behind the doors. Both halves are load-bearing.

• Keep the pipeline current and moving. Every active prospect has an owner, a stage, a last touch, and a next step. Calls are scheduled and prepared. Follow-ups happen when they are supposed to. Proposals, scopes, and decks reach the right person in the right version.
• Help manage the designers and collaborators working across Sunspell and its ventures. Keep briefs, feedback, deliverables, and deadlines organized, and make sure the people doing the work have what they need.
• Keep our internal operating system accurate, current, and genuinely useful. Our systems are only as useful as the information inside them.
• Vendors, subscriptions, invoices, expenses, account access, shipping, calendars, documentation, renewals, and the fifty smaller things that become expensive when they are late.
• When something happens repeatedly, help turn it into a process. The goal is not simply to execute the tenth proposal, onboarding, follow-up, hiring process, or launch correctly. It is to make the tenth one easier than the first.
• Above everything else, close loops. Meetings produce next steps. Next steps have owners. Follow-ups go out. Decisions are recorded. Nothing important disappears because everyone thought someone else had it.
• Co-support the Managing Director across company and product roadmaps. Keep priorities, owners, dependencies, decisions, and next steps visible and current. The Managing Director owns the roadmap; your job is to help make sure it becomes reality.
• Co-own the hiring process with the Managing Director. Source and coordinate candidates, manage outreach and scheduling, keep the pipeline organized, and make sure strong people move quickly. As candidates progress, work closely with the Managing Director and Founder through collaboration and behind-the-scenes evaluation of who fits the team, the work, and the way we build.

you-are-in-the-room

Proximity is part of the job.

You will work directly with the Managing Director and Founder and join meetings, events, and conversations involving clients, prospective hires, partners, and investors. The point is not simply access. It is context.

We want you to understand how a client relationship develops, how we decide who belongs on the team, how a roadmap changes, how a product becomes a company, and how decisions get made when there is not yet a playbook. You will have visibility into contracts, finances, client relationships, hiring, company formation, and internal decisions, and we expect the judgment, integrity, and discretion that come with that.

what-it-is

Operations first. The rest can follow.

Strategy, client leadership, closing, product, marketing, design, and company building are all things this seat can grow toward. They are not what we are hiring you to own on day one.

What we need first is deceptively simple: clean records, nothing dropped, consistent follow-up, an accurate operating system, and the machinery running. For now, the pitch is not yours to run and the roadmap is not yours to own. You are helping make both possible while learning how they work from one of the closest seats in the company.

the-fit

The best version of this person is unusually calm and slightly obsessive about state. You can hold thirty open threads without dropping one, but you would still rather write them down than trust yourself to remember them.

• You close loops. Anything handed to you either comes back finished or comes back with a question. Never silence.
• You write clearly and briefly. Short lines, plain words, no filler.
• You follow up politely and persistently without needing a reminder.
• You know where things stand, or exactly where to find the answer.
• You do what you say you are going to do and communicate changes early.
• You respect people's time and arrive prepared.
• You have urgency without manufactured emergencies.
• You flag problems while there is still time to solve them.
• You like systems more than heroics.
• You have judgment about what to handle and what to elevate.
• You are discreet with contracts, numbers, client information, hiring conversations, and internal decisions.
• You want to make the role your own over time through trust and groundwork.

poor-fit

Where this might not land

• You want the interesting work but would resent the admin.
• You need a perfectly defined lane that will look identical six months from now.
• You need fully formed instructions before you can start.
• You need someone watching in order to perform.
• You go quiet when you are behind.
• You think certain work is beneath you.
• You are looking for something temporary rather than a role that can grow.

possibly

Your ability may be ahead of your resume.

You do not need a perfect resume, a famous logo, or a specific degree. You might be early in your career, still in school, or recently out. You might have worked as an executive assistant, coordinator, producer, project manager, studio manager, or in something unrelated that taught you how to run a demanding calendar, project, team, or room.

growth

Internship, apprenticeship, or full-time.

Internship

Full-time

• Where you start depends on your experience, ability, and the amount of responsibility you are ready to own. These are entry points, not rigid stages.
• You are learning. The scope is looser, you are exposed to a wide range of the operation, and we expect you to ask questions, absorb quickly, and find where you can become useful.
• You are learning while owning real responsibilities. The pay is higher, the scope is clearer, and there is more independence, accountability, and trust.
• Full trust and meaningful ownership. You are responsible for a real part of the operation and expected to make it better. Full-time roles come with higher compensation, the full benefits package, and opportunities for equity depending on role, level, and contribution.
• The larger goal is that you eventually manage operations across one or several entities inside the Sunspell ecosystem. We want to develop this person, give them increasing scope as they earn it, and invest in their growth as seriously as we expect them to invest in ours.

The particulars

The particulars

Location New York, with early onboarding in the office.

Start Early October or as soon as possible.

Structure Intern, apprentice, or full-time depending on experience and readiness.

Team Work directly alongside the Managing Director and Founder.

compensation

Compensation

Compensation is set according to level, scope, and experience. Where you land depends more on what you have actually run and the level at which you can operate than what your last title happened to be.

The larger opportunity is the scope that can follow: a real operating function with proximity to nearly every part of the company and a deliberate path toward greater ownership if the work supports it.