Operations Associate

Job description

San Francisco · Internship / Full Time · In-person

Photon is building infrastructure for a world where AI agents become first-class participants in how people communicate, work, and live.

We’re looking for an exceptional operator to work closely with the founders and help keep both the company and the people behind it running at full speed.

This is not a traditional executive assistant role. You’ll own a wide range of operational problems — from founder logistics and scheduling to recruiting coordination, company operations, events, research, travel, and whatever else becomes the highest-leverage problem that day.

What you’ll do

Own the founders’ calendars, scheduling, travel, reservations, and day-to-day logistics.

Handle personal logistics that free up founder time and attention.

Coordinate meetings, interviews, candidates, investors, customers, and external partners.

Help run company events, offsites, dinners, conferences, and team activities.

Research and execute one-off projects: finding vendors, sourcing equipment, comparing options, making purchases, or solving unexpected operational problems.

Keep track of important follow-ups and make sure things don’t fall through the cracks.

Build lightweight systems and processes that make Photon operate more efficiently.

Work across recruiting, finance, office operations, customer operations, and other functions as needed.

Take ambiguous problems from “someone should figure this out” to completely handled.

Who you are

Extremely organized, reliable, and detail-oriented.

High-agency — when you see a problem, your instinct is to solve it.

Fast and resourceful. You’re unusually good at figuring things out on the internet, over the phone, or by finding the right person.

Comfortable operating with incomplete information and changing priorities.

Excellent written and verbal communicator.

Discreet and trustworthy with confidential company and personal information.

Have strong judgment and know when to make a decision yourself versus escalate.

Willing to do both high-level operational work and seemingly small tasks if they create leverage.

Energized by working closely with founders in a fast-moving startup environment.

You’ll thrive here if

You like being the person who makes things happen.

One hour you might be coordinating an important candidate interview, the next figuring out an urgent travel change, sourcing hardware for the team, organizing a customer dinner, or building a better system so none of those things require manual work again.

There won’t always be a playbook. Your job is to create one.

Why this role

You’ll work directly with the founders and have unusually broad exposure to how an early-stage technology company is built — product, hiring, customers, fundraising, operations, and everything in between.

For someone who wants to become an exceptional operator, founder, Chief of Staff, or startup leader, there are few roles with a steeper learning curve.