About First Round

First Round is a venture capital firm that works with founders exclusively at the earliest stages of company building, often when all they have is an “imagine if.” We fill in where we can until the team is filled out, tackling crucial early hiring and equipping those who are great at building product with the skills to sell it, too. By getting the foundational firsts right, we increase the odds of finding extreme product-market fit. Our founders’ “imagine ifs” have turned into companies like Notion, Roblox, Uber, and Square.

About First Round's Founder Success Team

At First Round, we invest in founders who possess not just strengths, but areas of true genius, whether it’s technical skill, product judgement, industry expertise, or a deep understanding of their customer’s pain point. But on the other side of every spike in talent are a few areas that are still underdeveloped, parts of the business where a founder doesn't have the skills and expertise — yet.

Simply put, there are many gaps that have yet to be closed when you’re only a 3-person startup. On the path to building a company of consequence, the very best founders are able to level up, both in terms of their own capabilities (by developing new muscles) and in the team around the table (by bringing in complementary talent).

That’s where our Founder Success team comes in, during the pivotal early years of company building. We fill in where we can until there's genius up and down the org chart, closing gaps around existing strengths while helping in the key growth areas on the transition from founder to founder & CEO. This might involve teaching a technical founder how to sell and take their product to market, or guiding them through making their first key hires.

About the Associate Recruiter Role

Associate Recruiters on the Founder Success team have a mission critical role — to support founders in hiring their early team members. Founders need to move quickly in making those early technical, GTM, and operations hires and we’re searching for someone to work hand-in-hand with them to find exceptional candidates. As an Associate Recruiter, you will work with 5-6 Founders at a time, building quality candidate pipelines and doing sourcing outreach to help tee up candidate intro calls for our founders.

You’ll have exposure to some of the most exciting founders and companies on the planet, working side-by-side with the next Uber, Notion or Square founders in their very earliest days. You’ll have the opportunity to build strong relationships with exceptional people and may even join one of the companies you support at some point (we highly encourage that path).

Key Responsibilities

Sourcing, Outreach, and Coordination - 80%

Engage in high-volume candidate sourcing for a wide range of roles, encompassing technical and non-technical positions (from founding IC to director-level).
Continuously refine your sourcing strategies to increase candidate acceptance rate through iterative improvements
Craft compelling outreach messages to engage candidates and get them excited about the opportunity
Act as the liaison between candidates and founders, facilitating introductions by coordinating calls with founders, sending reminders, and gathering feedback — all while ensuring clear and timely communication throughout the process