About Hermessi
Hermessi recruits, trains, and places AI-enabled Chiefs of Staff and Operations Managers with founders and CEOs running high-growth businesses in the US. We find exceptional talent, invest in their development through continuous training and AI upskilling, and match them with executives who need more than an assistant — they need someone to run the business.
Our candidates go through rigorous vetting and a structured bootcamp before being placed. Once matched, you don't support the founder. You become the operator who runs the business so the founder can be the visionary.
The Role
This is not an executive assistant role with a fancy title. This is the person who operates the business day-to-day.
You'll be placed directly with a founder or CEO (based on the US) as their Business Operator. The founder sets the vision and makes the calls that only they can make. You handle everything else. You run the business, manage the team, own the metrics, deal with fires, and only escalate the decisions that truly require the founder's judgment.
The goal is simple: the founder should be able to step away from daily operations entirely and trust that you've got it.
What You OwnOperations & Accountability
Run the operational rhythm of the business — meetings, priorities, follow-through, deadlines. You own the cadence.
Track and own key business metrics. Distill them down for the founder in clear, actionable updates. Keep the team accountable to those numbers.
Filter everything before it gets to the founder. Problems, requests, decisions — you handle what you can and only pass through what genuinely needs their input.
Deal with fire drills. When things break — and they will — you solve them. You don't escalate problems, you escalate solutions.
Strategic Projects & Execution
Take strategic projects from idea to completion. Founder says "we need to fix onboarding" or "figure out our hiring plan for Q3" — you scope it, build it, ship it, report back.
Manage cross-functional initiatives that don't have a clear owner. The stuff that sits between departments and dies because nobody owns it — that's yours.
Prepare the founder for high-stakes moments — investor calls, board meetings, key client presentations, partnership negotiations. Research, briefing docs, talking points, follow-ups.
People & External Relationships
Manage team members and direct reports. Push accountability, run standups, ensure deliverables ship on time.
Own the recruiting funnel end-to-end — write job descriptions, screen candidates, manage the pipeline, and only bring the final shortlist to the founder for decision.
Handle client-facing and external communications on behalf of the founder — customers, vendors, partners, investors. You represent the founder when they're not in the room.
Budget & Financial Operations
Own or manage budget decisions — approving vendor spend, negotiating contracts, managing contractor payments, tracking expenses.
Handle financial operations like invoicing, expense reporting, and vendor management so the founder never touches it.
AI, Automation & Systems
Document existing workflows and SOPs across the business. If they don't exist, create them.
Identify manual, repetitive processes and build automations using Make, Zapier, Claude Code, and other AI tools to eliminate them.
Monitor and optimize existing automations and AI workflows — ensure they're running at 100% and adjust when things change.
Continuously look for new opportunities to use AI and automation to increase the business's capacity without adding headcount.
What We're Looking For
Operational experience in fast-moving environments. 3+ years in a role where you ran operations, managed projects, and supported a senior leader directly — Chief of Staff, Head of Ops, Director of Operations, Business Operations Manager, or similar. Startups, SMBs, agencies, consulting — anywhere you've had to figure it out without a playbook.
You think like an owner, not
