Founding Account Executive

Job Description

Founding Account Executive

Location: Remote in US

Reports to: CEO

Contract: Full-time, permanent

Travel: Regular travel across the territory, plus occasional national travel for conferences and customer meetings

About the role

StudyStash is looking for a Founding Account Executive to build our US higher education sales motion from the ground up. This is an early-stage role with real ownership: you'll help establish our sales process and playbook rather than inherit a finished one, generate your own pipeline, and own the full sales cycle end-to-end. You'll have the freedom, and the expectation, to develop and implement your own ideas about how StudyStash wins in the university market.

It's a role for someone energised by building. You'll work closely with the CEO and product team, with plenty of scope to make the role your own and a genuine path into leadership as we scale.

What you'll do

Closing new business (60%)

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• Own the full sales cycle end-to-end, from first outreach through to close
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• Generate your own pipeline through proactive outbound across US university prospects
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• Book and lead discovery calls and remote demos, tailoring the pitch to Provosts, Student Success leaders, Centre for Teaching & Learning teams, instructional designers, faculty, librarians, procurement, and IT stakeholders
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• Carry deals through to close and help customers to the point of implementation, rather than handing off immediately
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• Lead RFP and procurement responses, and support pilot programmes through to institutional roll-out
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Sales support & process (25%)

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• Build compelling demo environments and evidence-based pitches
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• Manage pipeline and opportunity data accurately in the CRM (Apollo)
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• Contribute to marketing materials, proposals, and key deal communications
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Shaping the motion (15%)

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• Test approaches, learn fast, and help build the repeatable playbook
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• Feed prospect and market intelligence back into product and marketing
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What we're looking for

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• Around 3+ years in a full-cycle sales or AE role, ideally in Edtech, higher ed, or the broader education sector
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• A track record of carrying and hitting a sales target
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• Comfortable prospecting, demoing, and closing without a large marketing engine behind you
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• Comfortable with ambiguity: happy to test, learn, and iterate in an early-stage environment
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• Organised and process-driven, with strong follow-up over a long sales cycle
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• Builds relationships by asking questions and listening, and comfortable saying "I'll go find the answer"
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• Confident presenter to mixed academic, technical, and commercial audiences
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• Self-motivated, independent, and easy to work with remotely
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• Happy as an individual contributor first, but keen to grow into leadership over time
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• Based within commuting distance of Sacramento and comfortable with a hybrid pattern
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What we offer

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• Competitive base $100k-120k
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• Uncapped commission on ARR closed (roughly 60/40 base-to-OTE split)
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• Hybrid working (typically 3 days/week in the Sacramento office)
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• The chance to be our founding sales hire in a fast-growing, AI-first, mission-driven Edtech company, with a real path to leadership as we scale
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