Symbal — Founding Strategic Projects Lead (Finance)

Type: Full-time | On-site | Palo Alto / Menlo Park, CA Compensation: $130,000–$175,000 base + uncapped OTE + competitive equity Hiring count: 1 Visa sponsorship: None available Reports to: Krishay (Founder)

About Symbal

Symbal is an RLM (reinforcement learning model) data company in the same category as Mercor and AfterQuery, selling premium, high-margin data to frontier AI labs. Recently raised from Founders Fund. The founders currently take on SPL work themselves, spending most of their day working with labs and ensuring data quality.

Two differentiators vs. competitors: (1) an uncapped commission structure (Mercor and AfterQuery have both capped theirs), and (2) each SPL personally carries $20–30M of ARR with extreme ownership. Average contract value is ~$2M, with some projects in the low seven figures and others in the high seven figures.

Founded: 2025 | Team size: 7–8 (Seed, 1–10) Industry: AI Tools Website: symbal.ai Office: Palo Alto / Menlo Park, CA

Why Candidates Should Join

• Uncapped upside: Uncapped commission structure — a real differentiator vs. Mercor and AfterQuery, which have both capped theirs.
• Extreme ownership: Each SPL personally carries $20–30M of ARR across customer projects.
• Founding seat: First Finance-track Strategic Projects Lead, reporting directly to the Founder with significant autonomy.
• Backing: Recently raised from Founders Fund.

The Role

Symbal is hiring its first Finance-track Founding Strategic Projects Lead to own the end-to-end delivery of frontier AI lab finance projects. The work keeps financial-modeling chops sharp — not on real-world transactions, but building RLM training data based on financial models (LBOs, comparables). The take-home is a difficult, unstructured Excel modeling exercise that filters heavily for fit.

What You'll Be Doing

• Quality control on task creation for Frontier AI Lab data projects
• Train other team members on task creation and quality standards
• Brainstorm product ideas to distribute products into the real world and to source proprietary data
• Negotiate partnerships with enterprises to access their data
• Carry $20–30M of personal ARR ownership across customer projects

Tech stack: Excel-based financial modeling (LBOs, comparables)

Requirements

• 2-5 years IB or PE
• Excel modeling + LBOs
• High grit, creative problem-solving
• Palo Alto / Menlo Park, 5 days in-person
• Weekends optional, team in office

Green Flags

• Top investment bank (Goldman, Morgan Stanley, JPM, Evercore, Centerview, Lazard, Moelis, comparable) or top PE firm (KKR, Blackstone, Apollo, Carlyle, comparable) with 2+ years tenure
• Boutique PE firm with strong reputation and demonstrated impact
• Strong school + strong bank combination
• Demonstrated grit: side projects, competitive academic achievements, athletics, or other high-intensity backgrounds
• Excitement about uncapped commission and willingness to grind for maximum upside

Red Flags

• No IB or PE experience. Hard exclude. Banking is non-negotiable.
• Bad bank + bad school combination.
• 5+ years experience positioning for senior or VP-level title. Hard exclude: not a fit for early-stage execution role.
• Doesn't care about money or wants 9-to-5 culture. Krishay direct: "if you don't care about money the role is probably not for you."
• Cannot or unwilling to work 5 days in-person at Palo Alto / Menlo Park office.

Role Details

Salary$130,000–$175,000 base + uncapped OTEEquityCompetitiveOn-site policy5 days in person, Palo Alto / Menlo Park; weekends optionalVisa sponsorshipNone availableEmployment typeFull-timeLocationPalo Alto / Menlo Park, CA

Benefits & Perks

• $130–175K base + uncapped OTE
• Lunch or dinner in office
• Health insurance
• Bay Club or Equinox membership

Interview Process

Stage 1 — Pending Approval — Candidates awaiting initial approval. Stage 2 — Intro Call (20–30 min) — Intro call with Krishay (Founder), COO, or another team member. Stage 3 — Take-Home Assignment (5 hours) — Build a financial model (LBO-style) from partial inputs, supplementing with synthetic data generated. Stage 4 — Take-Home Review (45 min) — Take-home review call. Stage 5 — Offer Extended Stage 6 — Hired — Candidate accepts and starts.