Job Description

What's Bench? Check us out in Medium, Betakit, Financial Post, our Instagram, and our Life at Bench Blog.

We acknowledge that Bench was founded on the traditional, ancestral, and unceded territory of the Coast Salish Peoples, including the territories of the xmkwym (Musqueam), Skwxwu7mesh (Squamish), and Slilwta/Selilwitulh (Tsleil-Waututh) Nations.

Businesses need to understand their financial performance, but for many smaller ones, this means a trade-off between managing their books and running their businesses.

Our mission is to help every business owner thrive, by providing financial insight and peace of mind in one seamless platform. From creatives to chiropractors, Bench helps thousands of small business owners and entrepreneurs master their financial lives. Because understanding your finances should be three things: simple, effortless, and affordable.

We're growing fast, and we're looking for exceptional people to join us on this incredible journey. Check out our culture guide to learn more about what it's like to work at Bench and read more about our business here!

What does the Retro team look like?

Retro is a team dedicated to large scope bookkeeping to help small business customers catch up on years of back taxes, clear up any potential tax delinquencies, and move forward with their businesses. We have huge growth ambitions on Retro because we have seen first hand how many small business owners fall behind on their taxes and need our support to get back on track. It's hard work being a small business owner, and bookkeeping often falls to the wayside when challenges arise. That's where we come in!

The Retro Delivery Team is a mighty team of ~30 people that specialize in servicing customers that need some extra attention and support to get their bookkeeping and business's financials under control, up to date, and achieve peace of mind in their lives as a whole. After the Retro Delivery team works their magic, the goal is for these customers to move on to our monthly bookkeeping service to maintain that going forward. We know there are many more business owners out there we could help, and we'd love to have someone as ambitious and excited as us to join our growing team.

What you'll get up to:

1) Responsibility for Retro Team Performance & Growth (including hiring and promotions)

• Setting clear performance expectations for the team and holding all team members accountable to these high expectations through frequent positive and constructive feedback at all levels
• Using data to report on success and identify areas of improvement; defining and then advocating for the creation of new data sets when the current data doesn't support your understanding of what really matters.
• Facilitating team meetings and other forms of communication to keep your team lead group and team inspired and informed
• Building the foundation of an excellent team through exceptional hiring and promotion decisions

2) Owning the experience of every single one of your teams' customers

• Accountability for all outcomes of our Retro bookkeeping services, and effective direction of the team to exceed the expectations of our service delivery
• Ensuring that the team are upholding the high service standards we have for our customers' experience, and effectively taking corrective action when Bench actions aren't conducive to our customers having a truly exceptional experience

3) Ongoing coaching and development of team members

• Holding regularly scheduled 1:1s with Team Leads on your team and frequent connections with Associates on the team to stay closely connected to their Bench experience, providing coaching in pursuit of great results.
• Constantly seeking or creating opportunities for the team to develop themselves to reach higher levels of capability in pursuit of their professional goals and fulfilling our business needs.
• Creating repeatable systems for developing entry level leaders within the Retro Delivery team

4) Accountability for the 3/6/12 month strategy for the Retro Delivery team

• Ensuring that a clear vision is in place for the team and that the vision is communicated clearly with other departments (what is important to us, what we are going to do to get there).
• Creating and delivering on quarterly Objectives and Key Results (OKRs) or Key Performance Indicators (KPIs)
• Prioritizing and leading key initiatives to systematically improve service delivery, which requires extensive collaboration with other departments at Bench, including but not limited to Technology, Product, & Design, Keep Up, Catch Up, Onboarding, Sales, Quality, and Business Operations.

5) Process and Systems Improvement & Infrastructure

• Taking full ownership over systems, processes, and workflows of the team, and acting as an agent of change when there are broad improvements that can better the experience of our customers and Benchmates
• Improving upon our variable pay, capacity planning and forecasting systems and processes, continuously iterating and applying learnings as you work within these systems

What you'll need:

• Team Leadership: You are an experienced team leader, with 2-3 years of leadership experience. You prioritize coaching, training, and mentorship to each person on your team. You must have demonstrated the ability to provide ongoing coaching, mentorship and training, to a broad range of people with varying experiences, that allows your team to achieve next level performance.
• Customer-first decision making: Everything we do is for our customers. You are continuously an advocate for creating and delivering an exceptional customer experience, and find incredible value in the relationships we build with our customers.
• Take 100% responsibility and make decisions quickly: You are responsible for your team's outcomes and experience, full-stop. You are hungry for data, and keep a close eye on all indicators of customer experience (feedback forms, NPS, escalations, etc.). You act with urgency when systems, processes or people fail to deliver great outcomes, identify the root cause and build back better.
• Have experience developing high performing teams: You develop exceptional individual contributors and emerging leaders through challenge and radically candid feedback. You are responsible for identifying and surfacing gaps in the performance of team members, and executing effective performance management (coaching, training, Performance Success Plans) with minimal support.
• You are resilient: You stay highly motivated and proactive when working in an evolving and ambiguous environment.
• An active and growing equity lens: You are deeply engaged in growing your ability to recognize systemic inequalities and take action. You address inequity within your team where it arises, advocate for affected staff, and collaborate with your team to build practices that give rise to equitable work, working environments, and outcomes.

It could be an even better fit if you:

• Are strategically minded: You are an experienced systems thinker and can demonstrate the power data and systems have on decision making. You have an analytical mind and are capable of breaking down large problems into smaller ones and consistently demonstrate a clear, logical and structured approach to problem solving.

What you'll get:

• At Bench we share information freely and openly whenever possible. The On-Target Earnings range for this role is $88,320 to $97,110 with a component of these earnings made up of variable pay.
• In addition, we offer an extended benefits package that includes paid vacation, paid flex days, stock options, and full health, dental, and vision.
• You'll get unlimited access to Bravely, our confidential, on-demand, 1:1 professional coaching service, and access to Inkblot Therapy, our virtual counselling service to support mental wellbeing and coaching for many of life's challenges.
• You will have the support of your manager and the opportunity to learn and develop with a team of unconventional & diverse Benchmates, who are all working together to achieve the same mission.
• We have a number of Affinity Groups - groups of people who have shared identities and experiences! The purpose of these groups is to support underrepresented Benchmates and amplify their voices.
• If you live in BC's Lower Mainland, you have the opportunity to work at home or in our downtown office location, depending on your preference! If you're interested in remote only, we currently focus our hiring efforts in the following provinces: British Columbia, Alberta, Ontario, New Brunswick, and Nova Scotia.
• We provide solutions to bring all teams together for collaboration and connection.
• Regardless of how many days you decide to visit the office, you'll have access to our Home Office Setup Fund to ensure that you have everything you need to work comfortably from home, from day one.
• You'll have the opportunity to work from somewhere other than your home province for up to 3 months, within a 12 month period.

Everyone has their own unique talents. Even if you don't meet 100% of the qualifications outlined above, tell us why you'd be a great fit for this role in your application.