Chief of Staff

Job Description

Job Description

About the role

Philo launched a significant operating reset in 2026 — new leadership structure, new meeting cadence, and a sharper focus on strategic clarity and accountability. A dedicated Chief of Staff is a core part of that reset.

This is a strategic Chief of Staff role. It exists to make Philo's most senior leaders more effective— not to absorb the operational work of the business. The right person sharpens the thinking, structures the agenda, keeps leadership aligned, and ensures that decisions made in the room actually happen. Execution of the company's work lives with the functional and program management teams. This role makes sure those teams have the right direction, the right inputs, and the right forums to do it.

The role reports to the SVP of Strategy & Operations and operates in service of the Strategy & Operations, COO, and CEO functions, with lighter-touch support for the CFO. It anchors to Strategy & Operations initially (~50% strategic and analytical agenda), supports the company operating rhythm (~35%), and provides CEO/CFO executive support including board coordination (~15%).

What this role is:
Just as importantly, this is a hands-on role. We're looking for someone with high ownership and low ego—someone who sees no task as beneath them. One day you may be framing a strategic recommendation for the executive team; the next you may be building the analysis, writing the memo, creating the deck, or coordinating the follow-through needed to get the work across the finish line. Success comes from a willingness to both think strategically and execute exceptionally.

What this role is not:
a program manager or a catch-all for unowned execution work. Sustained program delivery lives with the Programs organization, and functional work lives with functional owners. The distinction: this role solves the problems that sit between functions and above programs — alignment, decision clarity, success criteria and measurement, prioritization conflicts — and hands the execution back with a clear path forward. It unsticks; it does not inherit.

Responsibilities

Strategic Research & Analysis

• Conduct research and analysis at the direction of the SVP of Strategy & Operations to support strategic planning, competitive intelligence, growth opportunity evaluation, and packaging and pricing decisions
• Synthesize inputs from across the business — data, external research, vendor outputs — into clear, decision-ready framing for the executive leadership team. Build and maintain awareness of the competitive landscape, market trends, and strategic context relevant to Philo's key bets
• Structure ambiguous problems, build a clear point of view, and present it concisely to senior leaders

Planning & Goal-Setting Process

• Partner with the executive leadership team to coordinate annual planning, quarterly prioritization, and the development of company goals and strategic initiatives
• Help develop implementation plans, milestones, and success metrics for new initiatives — ensuring strategic decisions translate into clear plans with owners
• Support the design and ongoing improvement of planning processes, goal-setting frameworks, and accountability mechanisms
• Ensure the right people are in the room at the right points in the planning cycle, and that outputs are clearly documented and communicated
• Drive cross-functional alignment by ensuring every strategic initiative has clear objectives, success criteria, accountable owners, defined decision rights, and an agreed execution plan, resolving ambiguity where ownership or accountability is unclear.

Operating Rhythm & Leadership Alignment

• Support SVP of Strat and Ops with owning the weekly business performance meeting agenda: collect inputs, ensure anomalies are pre-researched and flagged before the meeting, coordinate pre-reads, and keep the meeting focused on diagnosis and action — not status recaps. Develop and maintain a consistent cadence of KPI analyses that explain performance trends, uncover root causes, and highlight opportunities for action.
• Support the COO in running the senior leadership team: prep agendas, distribute pre-reads, and track decisions and commitments through the operating infrastructure
• Coordinate leadership async updates after key decision-making meetings — ensuring decisions, priorities, and next steps are clearly communicated to the right people
• Own the leadership operating calendar — right meetings at the right cadence, right people in the room, preparation requirements communicated in advance
• Maintain Philo's core operating infrastructure: decision logs, commitment trackers, and related systems that keep the leadership team accountable
• Ensure executive review meetings have clear agendas, decision objectives, and expected outcomes. Partner with cross-functional leaders to distill materials into concise executive summaries and drive alignment on decisions, owners, and next steps.

Cross-Functional Problem Solving

• Act as an extension of the executive leadership team to identify opportunities, resolve operational challenges, and remove barriers to execution across the organization
• Partner with the Programs organization on cross-functional initiatives: this role unblocks and aligns at the leadership level; sustained program delivery stays with Programs

Executive Forums & High-Stakes Moments

• Facilitate leadership offsites, annual planning sessions, company bi-annual gathering, and strategic reviews — owning the design, preparation, and follow-through for forums that shape company direction
• Support board meeting preparation: coordinate slide ownership, track contributors, manage review timelines, and ensure materials are complete and polished
• Coordinate preparation for other high-stakes leadership moments — all-hands materials, due diligence requests, executive briefings — where quality and timing matter
• Own async communication when key leaders are offline, ensuring nothing falls through

Qualifications

• 8+ years of experience in strategy, chief of staff, business operations, or executive program management roles
• Experience in media, streaming, or consumer subscription businesses — you understand the economics of subscriber acquisition, retention, and engagement, and you can speak the language of this industry from day one
• Experience working directly alongside C-suite or senior VP-level leaders in a high-trust, high-proximity environment
• Demonstrated track record of owning strategic research, synthesis, and analysis — not just coordinating it: structuring ambiguous problems, working with data, and turning it into decision-ready framing for leadership
• Experience designing or improving operating rhythm and planning processes — leadership reviews, planning cycles, goal-setting frameworks — in a fast-moving environment
• Exceptional written communication: research briefs, agendas, decision framing, and async updates are the core work product of this role, and the quality of your thinking shows up in the quality of your writing
• The instinct to know when to solve a problem yourself and when to sharpen it and hand it back — you can unstick a cross-functional issue without becoming its permanent owner
• Confident but not territorial: strong enough to push back and offer a point of view, secure enough to support rather than lead, and clear-eyed about where your role ends and others' begins
• High discretion and professional judgment — this role sits close to sensitive conversations including board materials, personnel, strategy, and transactions
• Comfort with ambiguity: the operating model at Philo was rebuilt this year, and this person will help build and refine infrastructure that is still taking shape
• Meticulous where it counts — board decks go to a board, leadership agendas go to a dozen senior leaders, and the work that goes out from this role needs to be right
• Experience supporting a strategic transaction process (M&A, fundraise, partnership) a plus

More about Philo

At Philo, we're a company that puts people first—both our subscribers and our team. We empower our colleagues to do their best work while supporting one another in pursuing shared goals. We value pragmatism, pride in our work, and passion, with transparency and openness as fundamental parts of our culture.

We're committed to diversity, equity, inclusion, and accessibility as we grow the Philo team and shape the future of TV. We believe that a diverse range of voices and perspectives enables us to innovate faster and create the best experiences for our subscribers. Philo is proud to be an Equal Opportunity Employer. We're committed to supporting every candidate and employee. If you need an accommodation at any stage of the process, please email View email address on us.fitly.work and we'll work with you to meet your needs.

Philo offers 70+ top-rated networks streaming live and on-demand, including AMC, BET, CMT, Comedy Central, Discovery Channel, Food Network, Hallmark Channel, HGTV, HISTORY, Investigation Discovery, Lifetime, MTV, Nickelodeon, OWN, VH1, We TV, and more. It also includes all the groundbreaking originals and blockbuster movies available with AMC+ and access to HBO Max Basic With Ads and discovery+. Our extensive library boasts over 85,000 titles, and our unlimited DVR allows users to save their favorite shows and movies for up to a year, skipping ads for a seamless viewing experience. Stream on up to three devices simultaneously, whether on your phone, tablet, laptop, or TV using Roku, Apple TV, Fire TV, Samsung TV, Android TV, Vizio TV, or Chromecast.

Philo is headquartered in San Francisco, with offices in New York City and Cambridge, MA. Our leadership team includes alums from HBO, Tubi, and Meraki, and is backed by NEA and industry partners like Warner Brothers Discovery, Paramount, AMC, and A&E.

Join us at Philo and be part of a team that's shaping the future of TV!

Status: Full-time
Location: Brooklyn, NY
Compensation: Includes annual salary, company stock options, and health benefits. Salary is determined by experience and location:

• San Francisco, New York City: $250K - $300K
• Boston, DC Metro, Los Angeles, Seattle: $240K - $280K
• Denver, Atlanta, Austin, Las Vegas, Sacramento, Chicago: $230K - $270K
• Texas, Florida: $220K - $260K

We value a diverse and inclusive workplace and we welcome people of different backgrounds, experiences, skills, and perspectives. Philo is an equal opportunity employer. We believe that everyone does their best work when they are supported by each other and the company, and we offer a generous set of benefits to make sure the Philo team is happy and healthy. Here is a sampling of the benefits we offer our team:

• Full health, dental and vision coverage for you and your family
• 401(k) plan with employer contributions (we match 100% of deferrals up to 3% of pay and 50% of the next 2% of pay)
• Flexible working hours
• Up to 20 weeks of fully paid parental leave
• Unlimited paid time off for vacation and sick leave
• $2,000 annual vacation bonus (we pay you to take a two week vacation)
• $5,250 annually for professional development and educational assistance
• $1,250 annual home office + TV stipend during first year of employment ($250 annually thereafter)
• $500/month ($6,000/year) bonus for employees who commit to working at least 3 days per week in our offices, plus generous commuter benefits ($315/month towards transit, rideshare, bike rental, or parking at our HQ office in San Francisco)
• Free Gympass subscription — an all-in-one corporate benefit that gives employees the largest selection of gyms, studios, classes, training and wellness apps
• And much more!

For California Residents: Philo's CCPA Notice at Collection – Employees, Applicants, Owners, Directors, Officers and Contractors

Pursuant to the San Francisco Fair Chance Ordinance, we will consider for employment qualified applicants with arrest and conviction records.

Use of Automated Tools in Our Hiring Process

We use software tools, including our applicant tracking system (Ashby), to help manage applications for this role. Automated features (i) assess the skills, experience, and qualifications relevant to the role as described in this posting, and (ii) flag applications that appear fraudulent, duplicative, or not genuinely submitted by the applicant.

A summary of the most recent independent bias audit of the automated employment decision tool used in this process, including the audit date and data source, is available here: Bias Audit Summary.

You may request that a member of our team review a decision through a process that does not rely on the automated tools, or request a reasonable accommodation, by emailing View email address on us.fitly.work. We will not retaliate against you for exercising your rights.

Information about the type and source of the data our tools collect, our data retention policy, and how these tools were used in evaluating your application is described in our Privacy Notice – Employees,Applicants, Officers, Directors, and Contractors, or available by emailing View email address on us.fitly.work.

Depending on your state of residence, you may have additional rights, including to an explanation of an adverse decision, correction of inaccurate data, and meaningful human review. To exercise these or ask whether they apply, email View email address on us.fitly.work.