Program Management, Embedded Payroll

About Gusto

At Gusto, we're on a mission to grow the small business economy. We handle the hard stuff—like payroll, health insurance, 401(k)s, and HR—so owners can focus on their craft and customers. With teams in Denver, San Francisco, and New York, we're proud to support more than 400,000 small businesses across the country, and we're building a workplace that represents and celebrates the customers we serve. Learn more about our Total Rewards philosophy. 

About the Role:

In this role, you'll support partners in building and launching payroll by bringing together the interdependent work streams of Partner Growth, Technical Solutions, and Customer Experience across both internal and external teams. Additionally, you'll develop scalable programs and tools to drive Gusto Embedded Payroll's ("GEP") rapid growth, ensuring our systems and processes evolve in step with our expanding partner ecosystem.

This will be a dynamic role, working across multiple disciplines both internally and externally. You'll work together with our teams (who are eager for the support) to refine and build programs as we scale. Since this function is still in its early stages, you'll have the opportunity to quickly develop and implement best practices to drive growth from the 1→10 phase and beyond. You'll be empowered by our Head of Program Management.

About the Team:

GEP is our newest business unit, driving the next phase of innovation and growth for Gusto. Our mission is to enable third-party SMB platforms to seamlessly build, sell, and serve payroll within their own products through our API. By expanding access to payroll services, we're bringing Gusto's people platform to hundreds of thousands more businesses than those we serve directly.

As GEP scales, our partnerships have grown more complex, serving thousands or even hundreds of thousands of employers. This rapid expansion has created a need for stronger coordination across GEP work streams, external partner teams, and cross-functional Gusto stakeholders. Program Management within GEP is a relatively new function, and in this role, you'll be part of a small team dedicated to driving alignment, improving collaboration, and ensuring smooth execution of our most critical initiatives.

Here's what you'll do day-to-day:

• Project Planning and Expertise: Own the end-to-end planning and execution of complex, multi-phase partner implementations across multiple workstreams. 
• Stakeholder Management: Build strong relationships with senior internal and external stakeholders. Proactively manage risks, navigate escalations, and align cross-functional teams on shared outcomes.
• GEP Interface: Act as the strategic connector across technical, operational, and growth teams within GEP. Ensure teams are aligned and mobilized to launch and scale partner payroll operations effectively.
• Cross-functional Facilitation: Lead coordination across x-GEP and x-Gusto initiatives, anticipating blockers, identifying dependencies early, and driving cross-team accountability to accelerate partner success.
• Process and Documentation: Continuously evolve and scale delivery frameworks and playbooks based on real-world learnings. Equip GEP with the tools, processes, and insights to execute efficiently and deliver repeatable partner success.

Here's what we're looking for:

• 6+ years of experience in program or project management, ideally with external client engagement and enterprise technology/SaaS environments
• Proven track record of leading complex, cross-functional programs from strategy through execution; skilled in driving alignment, influencing senior stakeholders, and delivering measurable business impact
• Deep understanding of partner ecosystems and lifecycle; able to identify key investment areas to accelerate partner success and retention
• Strong executive presence and communication skills (both written and verbal), with experience driving alignment across global and cross-functional teams
• Demonstrated ability to operate autonomously in fast-paced, ambiguous environments; known for resourcefulness, adaptability, and a solutions-oriented mindset
• Strategic thinker with a bias toward scalable systems and continuous improvement; capable of identifying and solving root problems to enable growth
• Balances hands-on partner engagement with the ability to design programs and processes that support long-term scale and efficiency
• Comfortable taking initiative in undefined spaces and leading through influence without authority

Our cash compensation amount for this role is targeted at $120,425 -$145,000/yr in Denver & most remote locations, and $145, ,000/yr for San Francisco & New York. Final offer amounts are determined by multiple factors including candidate experience and expertise and may vary from the amounts listed above.

Gusto has physical office spaces in Denver, San Francisco, and New York City. Employees who are based in those locations will be expected to work from the office on designated days approximately 2-3 days per week (or more depending on role). The same office expectations apply to all Symmetry roles, Gusto's subsidiary, whose physical office is in Scottsdale.

Note: The San Francisco office expectations encompass both the San Francisco and San Jose metro areas. 

When approved to work from a location other than a Gusto office, a secure, reliable, and consistent internet connection is required. This includes non-office days for hybrid employees.

Our customers come from all walks of life and so do we. We hire great people from a wide variety of backgrounds, not just because it's the right thing to do, but because it makes our company stronger. If you share our values and our enthusiasm for small businesses, you will find a home at Gusto. 

Gusto is proud to be an equal opportunity employer. We do not discriminate in hiring or any employment decision based on race, color, religion, national origin, age, sex (including pregnancy, childbirth, or related medical conditions), marital status, ancestry, physical or mental disability, genetic information, veteran status, gender identity or expression, sexual orientation, or other applicable legally protected characteristic. Gusto considers qualified applicants with criminal histories, consistent with applicable federal, state and local law. Gusto is also committed to providing reasonable accommodations for qualified individuals with disabilities and disabled veterans in our job application procedures. We want to see our candidates perform to the best of their ability. If you require a medical or religious accommodation at any time throughout your candidate journey, please fill out this form and a member of our team will get in touch with you.

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Personal information collected and processed as part of your Gusto application will be subject to Gusto's Applicant Privacy Notice.