Job Overview
We're looking for an experienced general manager to start January 4, 2027. This is not a chief of staff position. It’s not a senior account director role with a fancy title. This is the person who runs Beacon day to day. You’ll inherit a capable team, a healthy client base, and a business with real momentum. Your job is to bring the operational rigour, accountability structures, and revenue discipline that will take us to the next level. The founder and director of client services hold shares, and the founder will remain involved as owner and retain final sign-off on a few things like the annual budget, leadership-level HR changes, and major financial decisions that deviate from the budget—everything else is yours to lead.
RESPONSIBILITIES
Operations and team leadership
- Lead the managers through regular 1:1s, setting clear expectations and supporting genuine development. We have a director of client services (DCS) to whom our people & project managers (PPMs) report. We have one newly promoted PPM and one newly hired PMP-certified project manager who is yet to be promoted to PPM. In the meantime, the DCS is responsible for managing the delivery team that will eventually serve under the corresponding PPM.
- Directly manage the communications coordinator, administrator, and finance manager, ensuring that marketing, invoicing, vendor payments, and day-to-day operations run without friction.
- Own HR by identifying hiring needs, writing job descriptions, screening candidates, and making decisions. Build your managers’ capacity to do the same over time.
- Build and maintain the operational infrastructure of the agency, including standard operating procedures (SOPs), KPI systems, reporting cadences, and the rhythms that keep a team aligned and accountable. We have a set company KPI dashboard that will serve as reporting to the owner; you will complete it monthly.
- Lead internal initiatives from decision through to completion, including professional development, website projects, and process improvements.
Sales and business development
- Own the agency’s revenue growth strategy, including referrals and repeat business and new business pipelines (from cold outreach to signed contracts).
- Lead formal proposals and pitching.
- Maintain the relationship-driven client work that Beacon is known for.
- Represent the agency in client-facing meetings (currently running at approximately three sales and three billable meetings per week).
Finance and planning
- Lead the annual budgeting process in partnership with the owner and finance team.
- Review financial performance regularly, audit expenses often, identify variances early, and make operational decisions to keep the business on track.
- Ensure reporting is accurate and timely; bring the owner in for final sign-off on major financial decisions.
Marketing
- Oversee the agency’s marketing function, delegating execution to the communications coordinator while keeping strategy on track.
- Run regular marketing meetings to ensure the agency’s own brand presence stays consistent and intentional.
REQUIREMENTS
You’ve run a significant piece of a creative agency, studio, or professional services firm—not as a specialist, but as someone who manages people, owns numbers, and makes decisions. You know what good creative work looks like without needing to do it yourself. You hold your team to a high standard without making it personal. You build systems because you genuinely believe they make everyone’s work better.
You are impeccable with your words. You’ve had the difficult conversations. You’ve let someone go when it was necessary. You’ve rebuilt a process that wasn’t working. You’ve gone after new business and lost, and then adjusted, gone back, and won.
You don’t need a founder in the room to feel confident. You report back clearly, flag problems early, and get on with it.
- Proven leadership experience: You have managed people for at least 10 years, ideally you've managed people who manage people. You have worked in a creative agency or have experience with similar professional services.
- A track record in business development: You're comfortable across both relationship-driven and formal pitch contexts.
- Real financial ownership: You’ve built budgets, managed to them, and used the numbers to make sound, sustainable decisions.
- Strong people instincts: You help others to develop and grow, earn trust individually, and hold people accountable with care.
- A bias toward building systems and routines: You don't just respond to what’s in front of you, you use data to improve systems.
- Excellent written and verbal communication: You are detail-oriented, crystal clear, and comfortable representing the agency externally.
We review applications on a rolling basis. Generic applications or applications from individuals without professional services management experience will not be considered at this time.
Pay: Up to $120,000.00 per year
Benefits:
- Dental care
- Employee assistance program
- Extended health care
- Flexible schedule
- Life insurance
- Paid time off
Work Location: Remote
