Vice President of Sales - Defense Markets - Austin, TX, Washington, DC, or remote

The Role

As a Vice President of Sales–Defense Markets at Striveworks, you’ll be challenged—and trusted—on day one to lead and develop methods to increase customer value and revenue through the focused development of relationships, markets, and customers. We are looking for an experienced, dedicated, and analytical executive who has a desire to build and grow a world-class defense sales organization. As the VP of Sales, you must have an in-depth knowledge and understanding of our products and their proven critical application to national security missions. You must be prepared to lead and align talented teams to deploy technology and deliver value to mission requirements. You must be an excellent communicator and have the ability to recruit talented sales executives with specialized, mission-aligned skills, and you should be able to quickly navigate any situation to reach desired goals.

You will be empowered with company resources and relationships through existing account opportunities, partnerships, co-selling agreements, contract vehicles, and teaming agreements. You will collaborate with leaders across our sales, engineering, and customer experience teams and be an integral part of the leadership team. You will develop sales strategy and sales structure, including go-to-market plans and new revenue opportunities, and you will deliver market feedback to the product and engineering teams.

You’re right for this opportunity if you enjoy creating value with customers and leading and directly contributing to sales operations and sales structure in a rapidly growing AI/ML company that is expanding upon its proven track record for developing tactical value in complex missions. Your day-to-day will include:

• Managing sales teams and maintaining sales operations excellence and growth
• Synthesizing customer requirements, structuring customer deals, and recommending new products and services in alignment with company strategic growth plans
• Monitoring the market and competitor products and activities for sales opportunities
• Providing detailed sales forecasting in coordination with the RevOps and FinOps teams
• Reviewing customer activity, anticipating customer needs, and improving customer satisfaction
• Outlining and managing sales budgets with the RevOps team
• Setting quarterly and annual sales goals to align with company strategic growth objectives

The anticipated base pay range for this position is $250,000–$350,000/year with an aggressive cash commission structure. Striveworks’ total compensation package includes a base salary, commission-based earnings, and annual performance-based equity grants.

This position offers a fully remote work environment but requires frequent and consistent customer engagement no less than 40% of the time. Preferred locations of residency for this role are the Austin, TX, or Washington, DC, metro areas.

The Right Fit

We spend a lot of time during our hiring process talking about shared values. 

Why? We passionately believe that fostering an environment where people can self-actualize and pursue greatness is the best way to achieve our individual and collective goals. 

What does this mean for you? We want to create an environment where you can thrive and achieve your goals, where you know the team shares your goals, and where you make and accept decisions for the team with humility. At Striveworks, we want your say/do ratio to be 1, and we want you to know that being part of a top-tier team means that there is no smartest person in the room. If that makes sense, we’re already on the same page. 

Here’s what we’re looking for:

• 10+ years of defense technology sales experience
• 5+ years of SaaS sales experience
• Executive experience managing senior professionals, quota-carrying sales leads across military departments and defense agencies
• In-depth knowledge of SaaS and enterprise SaaS selling strategies and methods, as well as employee motivation techniques to consistently achieve sales growth goals
• Excellent leadership, communication, interpersonal, and customer service skills
• Experience selling data and/or AI/ML technology solutions
• Strategy and implementation experience in new start environments
• Experience landing enterprise accounts and growing sales to enterprise accounts, as well as expertise navigating enterprise sales cycles
• Active Top Secret US security clearance (TS/SCI preferred)

The Wish List

We’re very interested in candidates who possess the above qualifications, and we appreciate and consider the addition of:

• Technical background in software, artificial intelligence, and/or machine learning
• Experience building and growing successful sales organizations engaged in national security
• Prior military service with command responsibility

The Benefits

• Top-of-market salary and total compensation
• Generous equity plan
• Health/vision/dental insurance
• Unlimited PTO
• Parental leave

Build, Deploy, and Maintain AI for an Unpredictable World

AI is driving a new Industrial Revolution. But most AI tools only work when the world looks the same tomorrow as it did yesterday. That’s rarely the case.

Striveworks was formed to fix this problem. Our platform lets teams build AI models, deploy them into unpredictable environments, and watch them deliver trustworthy results—day after day. Our approach has transformed AI outcomes for organizations where failure is never an option. As a result, Striveworks was recognized as an exemplar in the National Security Commission on Artificial Intelligence Final Report. 

In 2023, Striveworks placed on the Deloitte Technology Fast 500 as one of the fastest growing technology companies in North America. In 2024, Striveworks was honored with a Built In Best Places to Work award—for the third year running. 

Striveworks is an Equal Opportunity Employer and does not discriminate in employment on the basis of race, color, religion, belief, sex (including pregnancy and gender identity or expression), national origin, social or ethnic origin, political affiliation, sexual orientation, marital status, disability, genetic information, age, membership in an employee organization, retaliation, parental status, military service, or other non-merit factors. Striveworks will not tolerate discrimination or harassment of any kind.

If you require assistance or a reasonable accommodation in the application process, please contact Operations at hr@striveworks.us.

Striveworks is a participating employer in the E-Verify program.