Chief Operating Officer

COO for Stealth Mode Early Stage Company

About the Role

SmartUp is looking for an Execution Lead to help lead a new B2B SaaS startup that is currently in its early stages. This stealth-mode company operates in a fast-growing market, was founded by a talented entrepreneur, and is being supported through SmartUp’s investment and acceleration program.

This is a hands-on COO role with responsibility for building the company’s operational foundations, running customer pilots, generating early revenue, and forming the initial team. The ideal candidate is a results-driven leader who takes ownership of strategy, marketing, sales, operations, customer learning, and people leadership.

Key Responsibilities

Company Operations and Early Execution

• Own and improve day-to-day operations across Sales, Marketing, Customer Operations, and internal functions, with a focus on building an early-stage company.
• Turn strategic goals and validation objectives into clear actions and measurable results.
• Build the company’s initial operational setup, customer learning cycles, and a repeatable sales process.

Revenue and Growth Leadership

• Lead the company’s first revenue-generating efforts as a hands-on operator.
• Oversee B2B sales activities, including pilot design, customer validation, pipeline health, forecasting, and KPI tracking.
• Improve sales efficiency and conversion throughout early customer cycles.
• Support market expansion assumptions and help develop additional revenue opportunities.

Team Leadership and Company Building

• Recruit, mentor, and evaluate early hires and cross functional contributors.
• Build scalable processes for hiring, onboarding, and performance management.
• Create a culture focused on accountability and execution.
• Work closely with the CEO and SmartUp on early organizational design.

Strategy and Cross-Functional Alignment

• Partner with the CEO on short-term and long-term strategic planning.
• Ensure alignment between strategic hypotheses, validation milestones, and daily execution.
• Support executive decision-making with data, customer insights, and operational judgment.
• Represent operations in leadership discussions and external meetings when needed.

Process, KPIs and Continuous Improvement

• Define and track KPIs related to validation, revenue, and operational execution.
• Implement tools and processes that enable fast learning and future scalability.
• Maintain operational excellence without unnecessary bureaucracy, using an approach suited to a stealth, early-stage environment.

Ideal Candidate Profile

Experience

• Experience leading execution as an operations lead.
• May be a former founder, including someone who did not succeed the first time.
• Strong background in sales-driven or revenue-focused organizations.
• Proven ability to build and scale operations.
• Experience with pilot-based sales cycles and customer validation processes.

Skills and Strengths

• Strong operational skills with the ability to execute quickly.
• Deep understanding of sales operations, KPIs, and performance management.
• Ability to move smoothly between strategy, execution, and hands-on work.
• Excellent leadership, communication, and decision-making abilities.
• Comfortable working in environments with ambiguity and incomplete information.

Leadership Style

• Hands-on, accountable and execution-focused.
• Commercially minded with strong sense of ownership.
• Data-driven while maintaining a people-first leadership approach.
• Works as a true partner to the CEO rather than operating in a functional silo.

What Success Looks Like

• A clear and disciplined operating rhythm with measurable validation KPIs.
• Strong alignment between strategy and execution.
• Early revenue traction and meaningful customer engagement.
• Operational foundations that support rapid growth as investment progresses.
• A high-performing early team and a strong, empowered leadership structure.