Description:
Persona is where the world’s best companies and the world’s best talent meet.
We place exceptional people from 98 countries into full-time, long-term remote roles with the most ambitious companies on earth. Fortune 500 enterprises, fast-growing startups backed by Sequoia, Founders Fund, and Andreessen Horowitz, and high-performing companies of every size in between. Project management, operations, finance, design, marketing, customer success, and more. One person, one dedicated client, built to last.
The bar is the highest in the industry. More than 200,000 people apply every month, and fewer than 1 in 2,000 are accepted. If you make it, you join a network of people who have cleared a standard most companies couldn’t recruit for on their own, and you get the kind of role that’s almost impossible to find on your own: industry-leading pay set against your experience and skill, real career growth, and a stable seat at a serious company, working from home, anywhere in the world.
Persona was founded in 2018 by two Stanford graduates on a simple idea: talent is everywhere, but the systems that connect talent to opportunity are broken. We’re rebuilding them, and we’ve grown into one of the fastest-growing companies in the global talent industry doing it.
We hire people who care about the craft of their work, take ownership without being asked, and want to build a career rather than just hold a job. If that’s you, we’d like to meet you.
Role Summary
We are hiring a Sales Account Manager to own the full client lifecycle, from outbound prospecting and discovery calls through ongoing account management, candidate-matching support, and expansion. Unlike a pure Account Executive (hunter only) or a pure Account Manager (post-sale only), this role does both: you'll take sales calls, run outbound and lead-gen motions, manage CRM hygiene, and continue to own each client relationship long after the deal closes — including partnering with internal recruiters and talent specialists on client-candidate matches. Ideal for a relationship-driven seller who is equally comfortable cold-calling a prospect, leading a discovery call, and quarterbacking a candidate placement.
Key Responsibilities
Sales & New Business
- Run outbound prospecting via cold email, LinkedIn, and phone to generate qualified pipeline
- Lead discovery calls with prospective clients to surface hiring needs, role profiles, and budget
- Qualify leads, run demos, and walk prospects through the staffing model and value proposition
- Prepare proposals, pricing, and contracts; negotiate commercial terms through to close
- Manage inbound leads with fast response times and structured follow-up
Account Management & Client Relationships
- Serve as the day-to-day point of contact for assigned clients across all stages of the engagement
- Run regular check-ins, business reviews, and renewal conversations
- Identify upsell and cross-sell opportunities (additional roles, expanded scope, new business units)
- Proactively address client concerns, escalations, and at-risk accounts
- Maintain a clean, accurate CRM pipeline with notes, next steps, forecasts, and weekly call reports
Client-Candidate Matching Support
- Partner with internal recruiters and talent specialists to translate client needs into candidate profiles
- Lead client kickoff and candidate-presentation calls
- Calibrate expectations with clients on shortlists, feedback, and next steps
- Coordinate trial periods, placements, and replacement processes when needed
Cross-Functional Coordination
- Collaborate with recruitment, operations, and leadership to deliver on client commitments
- Share market and client feedback with marketing and product/ops teams
- Contribute to playbooks, templates, and process improvements as the function scales
Required Qualifications
- 3-5 years of experience spanning both sales (AE, BDR, SDR) and account management or customer success — ideally in staffing, recruiting, BPO, B2B services, or SaaS
- Proven track record running outbound motions AND managing a book of existing accounts
- Direct experience leading discovery calls and qualifying prospects against an ICP
- Hands-on experience with CRM software, including pipeline management, forecasting, and reporting
- Strong negotiation and contract-closing skills
- Excellent written and verbal communication; able to influence stakeholders at all levels, including C-suite
- Ability to manage multiple deals and accounts concurrently without dropping detail
- Comfort balancing inbound and outbound activity in the same week
- Fully fluent in English
- Ability to commit long-term and full-time
Preferred Qualifications
- Prior experience at a staffing agency, recruitment firm, RPO, or talent marketplace
- Familiarity with sales engagement tools (Outreach, Apollo, Salesloft, Lemlist) and prospecting tools (LinkedIn Sales Navigator, ZoomInfo)
- Experience matching candidates to client roles or participating in candidate-presentation calls
- Background carrying a quota or revenue target while also owning a book of business
- Experience selling into VC-backed startups or scaling tech companies
Tools & Technologies
- Close CRM, Apollo, Salesloft, LinkedIn Sales Navigator, ZoomInfo, Calendly, Google Workspace, Slack, Asana, PandaDoc
Core Competencies
- Hybrid mindset: equally comfortable hunting and farming
- Relationship-builder with strong commercial instincts
- Sharp discovery skills; asks the right questions to qualify
- Highly organized across many concurrent deals and accounts
- Strong CRM discipline — accurate forecasting, clean notes, on-time follow-ups
- Cross-functional collaborator with recruiters and operations
- Resilient under quota and renewal pressure; cool under client escalations
- Sound commercial judgment on pricing, scope, and negotiation
What We Offer
- Best salaries in the industry
- Work from anywhere permanently
- Opportunities for growth and advancement
- A fast-paced and collaborative environment
- A warm, people-first company culture
- Get paid in your currency of choice
- Additional benefits
