Associate Relationship Manager, Startups & Venture Capital

Salesforce•San Francisco, CA

1d•$113,120 - $151,340•Hybrid

About The Position

Salesforce is seeking a Trailblazer for its Launchpad program, focused on supporting early-stage, VC-backed startups. This role is not a traditional sales position but a builder's role, working with sales teams to engage with thousands of early-stage companies. The ideal candidate will be able to demo, configure, connect APIs, and discuss AI agents and developer tooling. This role involves bringing the full capabilities of Salesforce's Agentic CRM to founders and building scalable programs and infrastructure. It's suited for individuals who have been the most technical person in a sales organization, the most commercial person on an engineering team, or have built something themselves and want to apply that energy within a global platform.

Requirements

A builder's mentality: creates things, solves problems with available tools, and doesn't wait for solutions.
Technical fluency: comfortable with AI-powered tools, platform configuration, and API-level conversations.
Hands-on experience with or genuine enthusiasm for vibe coding, AI agents, or building with AI-powered development tools.
Strong familiarity with the startup ecosystem: understanding how early-stage companies are built, founder priorities, and decision-making with limited resources.
Exceptional communication skills: ability to earn technical founder trust and translate complexity into clarity.
Scrappy, high-volume approach to relationship building: gets more done with less.
Self-starter mentality with strong work ethic, personal drive, and character qualities aligned with Salesforce's core values.
Willingness to travel as needed (~15%).

Nice To Haves

4–6 years of relevant experience (venture capital, enterprise software, startup ecosystem roles, sales, or business development) with a track record of building or operating at the technical and commercial intersection of an early-stage company.
Direct experience working with or inside accelerator programs, founder communities, or early-stage VC networks.
Familiarity with the Salesforce platform and/or the GTM tech stack for startups, with a perspective on AI-powered tooling, CRM, and developer platforms.
Experience in a Solutions Engineer, technical sales, or builder-adjacent role.
Experience hosting or managing ecosystem events, founder programs, or partner activations.
Degree in Economics, Finance, Business, Computer Science, or a related field.

Responsibilities

Design and build scalable technical on-ramps for early-stage startups, including onboarding workflows, accelerator programming, and lightweight implementation guides.
Own a high-volume territory of VC-backed startups under 50 employees, utilizing programs and tooling for coverage.
Build and maintain relationships with top-tier accelerator programs and founder communities for consistent, repeatable cohort-level engagement.
Work closely with Salesforce SMB sales leadership to align on startup accounts and ensure appropriate support.
Track and manage territory performance, contributing to regular portfolio reviews with Launchpad leadership.
Help early-stage founders implement and derive value from Salesforce by configuring use cases, connecting integrations, and demonstrating Agentforce capabilities.
Bring a technical point of view on AI-powered GTM stacks, including AI agents, automation, and developer tooling.
Educate founders on Headless 360 for building on the Salesforce platform and AgentExchange for extending their stack.
Utilize vibe coding and AI-assisted configuration to build quickly and demonstrate possibilities to founders.
Act as a liaison between founder technical questions and the Salesforce ecosystem, knowing when to provide direct support and when to involve other resources.
Serve as the Launchpad expert for Salesforce SMB sales teams, educating them on engaging early-stage companies and their technical support needs.
Run enablement sessions for the sales organization, providing technical context for credible conversations with founder-led companies.
Collaborate with Launchpad leadership to share learnings from the SMB segment with the broader team.
Host and facilitate curated founder events, accelerator programming, and ecosystem activations.
Build relationships within founder communities, accelerator networks, and early-stage VC firms.
Help founders discover the full Salesforce ecosystem, including Agentforce, AI-powered automation, and AgentExchange.
Gather and synthesize founder feedback to improve Launchpad and Salesforce's approach to early-stage companies.
Contribute to broader Launchpad community initiatives and campaigns.
Contribute to internal portfolio performance reviews and provide data-driven insights on the SMB startup landscape.
Provide a point of view on the evolution of the early-stage ecosystem and its implications for Launchpad's strategy.
Own ad hoc strategic projects contributing to the growth and success of the Launchpad program.