Vice President of Sales

Encore AI; New York (NY); On-site; USD 150,000 - 500,000; Full time

Benefits offered by this job

Equity compensation

Job summary

Encore AI, based in New York, is seeking a high-caliber sales leader to drive revenue with a small team of AEs and a sales engineer. You will sell directly alongside the CEO into mid-size US banks and lenders, define ICPs, and build a repeatable pilot process to accelerate deals.

You will manage a player-coach team, shape the sales motion at an early stage, and compete in a regulated environment. This in-office role requires NY presence and strong stakeholder management.

Qualifications

• Has managed a small team of AEs while still carrying their own pipeline.
• Built a sales motion at an early stage with ICP and pilot process.
• Sold into regulated financial services environments and complex buying processes.
• Based in New York or willing to relocate; in-office role.

Responsibilities

• Manage a team of 2 account executives and 1 sales engineer from day one, growing to 5 AEs by year end.
• Sell directly alongside the CEO into mid-size US banks and lenders.
• Define ICP and qualification criteria from successful pilots to prioritize the pipeline.
• Design the proof-of-value pilot structure with one metric, fixed timeline, and clear path to contract.
• Build reference assets from successful pilots to enable the team to sell without CEO on calls.
• Develop pipeline sources beyond CEO’s network: inbound, outbound, and referrals.
• Run discovery-first sales cycles: quantify pain on first call, demo live, close the loop without extra follow-ups.
• Report NA numbers and plans to the CEO and the board.

Skills

Team leadership

GTM strategy

Sales to financial services

Stakeholder management

Job description

Encore AI builds AI agents for financial institutions that handle real banking workflows end to end: onboarding, lending, applications, servicing, transaction and card queries, and handoff to a human when needed. Live today at banks and lenders including Byline Bank and iLending. At Byline Bank, Encore cut KYC onboarding time by 30% and false positives by 15%. At iLending, it drove 30% higher loan conversion. Backed by Team8, having raised $30M, and doubling in size every six months.

The moment

The product works in production, at real banks, with numbers to show for it: 30% faster KYC onboarding and 15% fewer false positives at Byline Bank, 30% higher loan conversion at iLending. Byline and iLending are proof that the model works — the opportunity is to turn that into a repeatable engine for winning the next twenty accounts like them. That means codifying the ICP and qualification criteria from what already worked, building a proof-of-value pilot structure banks can move through quickly, and turning Byline and iLending into reference stories the team can sell from directly. You’ll lead a team of 2 account executives and a sales engineer from day one, growing to 5 account executives by the end of the year, and sell alongside the CEO directly into mid-size US banks and lenders — the same kind of buyer who has already said yes.

What you’ll own

• Manage a team of 2 account executives and 1 sales engineer from day one, growing to 5 account executives by the end of the year — set targets, run pipeline reviews, coach live calls.
• Sell directly alongside the CEO into mid-size US banks and lenders — the head of retail banking, SVP lending, and the CPO/CDO/COO who signs.
• Define the ICP and qualification criteria from what has already worked at Byline and iLending, and use it to prioritize the pipeline.
• Design the proof-of-value pilot structure: one agreed conversion metric per pilot, a fixed timeline, and a clear path from pilot to signed contract.
• Build the case-study and reference assets from Byline and iLending that the team can use to sell without the CEO on the call.
• Build pipeline sources beyond the CEO’s network — inbound, outbound, and referral — and decide the right mix.
• Run discovery-first sales cycles: quantify the prospect’s pain and urgency on the first call, demo live, and close the loop without extra follow-up demos.
• Report the North America number and plan to the CEO and the board.

What we’re looking for

• Has managed a small team of AEs (ideally with a sales engineer alongside) while still carrying their own pipeline — this is a player-coach role, not pure management.
• Has built a sales motion at an early stage — defined an ICP, set up a proof-of-value or pilot process, not just executed one someone else designed. Bonus if you’ve crossed a real ARR milestone doing it.
• Has sold into a regulated or otherwise complex buying environment — financial services, banking, lending, or similarly compliance-heavy verticals strongly preferred. Comfortable in a room with a CFO, FP&A, or compliance stakeholder.
• Can describe, concretely, how they qualify and quantify urgency on a first call, and why it shortens their sales cycle.
• Has sold against a crowded competitive field and won on differentiation, not price — and can describe how they track and counter specific competitors.
• Based in or willing to relocate to New York. This is an in-office role.

Nice to have

• Familiarity with founder-led, fast-moving organizations.
• Experience selling AI or agentic products, or translating a technical product into an economic story for a non-technical buyer.

Process & compensation

Expect five conversations: an initial screen, a deeper GTM/strategy discussion, 30 minutes with the CEO, a technical/product session with the CTO, and a final round where you’ll present how you’d build the North America business.

Compensation: $150K–$250K base, $300K–$500K OTE (2x base at plan), plus equity — equity economics are discussed directly with the CEO in the final stages.creating requisitions 'from scratch'