Corporate Finance & Strategy, R&D Opex

Anthropic•San Francisco, WA

3d•Hybrid

About The Position

Anthropic is seeking a Strategic Finance partner to join its Finance team, focusing on operating expenses (OpEx) and partnering primarily with the Engineering organization. This role involves being the financial partner to engineering leaders, assisting them in making informed decisions regarding headcount, vendor spend, tooling, and operational investments that support research and product development. As the company grows, this position will be instrumental in shaping how OpEx is planned, allocated, and managed. The role requires building driver-based models that link vendor and tooling expenses to technical inputs such as usage, seats, throughput, and capacity. The individual will need to engage with engineering leaders on the technical aspects influencing these drivers and challenge assumptions when necessary. The ideal candidate is proactive, asks critical questions, challenges assumptions, and helps engineering leaders arrive at optimal decisions.

Requirements

Have experience in FP&A, OpEx or G&A finance preferably at high-growth technology companies.
Have demonstrated experience building driver-based financial models — tying spend to operational and technical inputs rather than top-down growth rates.
Are comfortable with technical concepts and have a genuine interest in understanding the systems, tools, and infrastructure behind the line items you're modeling.
Have a track record of pushing back constructively on senior stakeholders — bringing data and clear reasoning to disagreements rather than deferring to the loudest voice in the room.
Demonstrate excellent communication and storytelling abilities, with experience presenting to C-suite executives and board members.
Have a bias toward action, strong work ethic, and experience driving operational outcomes under tight timelines.
Thrive in fast-paced, dynamic environments and can navigate ambiguity with confidence.
Possess strong collaboration skills and can build effective partnerships across functions and levels.
Are passionate about Anthropic's mission to build safe, beneficial AI systems.

Nice To Haves

Have experience at a high-growth technology company or startup.
Possess expertise with modern financial planning tools (e.g., Anaplan, Pigment).
Have direct experience partnering with Engineering, R&D, or other technical organizations as a finance business partner.
Have hands-on experience modeling vendor spend with technical drivers — cloud/SaaS usage, seat-based tooling, observability and data infrastructure costs, etc.
Possess a technical background or coursework (CS, engineering, quantitative field) or comparable self-taught fluency.
Have experience leading headcount planning and workforce modeling at scale.

Responsibilities

Serve as the primary finance partner to Engineering leaders, providing guidance and recommendations on vendor and tooling spend, and resource allocation decisions.
Build and maintain driver-based financial models for engineering OpEx — tying vendor and tooling spend to the underlying technical drivers (usage, seats, throughput, capacity, utilization) rather than top-down growth assumptions.
Develop a deep understanding of the engineering tooling and vendor stack so you can engage substantively with technical leaders on what's driving spend and where it's headed.
Lead budgeting, forecasting, and long-range planning for the engineering organization, partnering with leaders to translate roadmaps into resource plans.
Push back constructively on assumptions, proposals, and forecasts — bringing data, sharp questions, and clear reasoning to help engineering leaders land on better decisions.
Prepare clear, concise financial reports, analyses, and variance commentary that highlight key trends, risks, and opportunities for engineering and finance stakeholders.
Establish reporting dashboards and scorecards that track engineering headcount, vendor spend efficiency, and other key operational metrics.
Drive analyses on build-vs-buy decisions, vendor consolidation, contract negotiations, and organizational design tradeoffs where finance can sharpen engineering decision-making.
Partner cross-functionally with Strategic Finance, FP&A, Accounting, Recruiting, and People teams to ensure engineering plans are aligned with broader financial strategy.
Participate in resource allocation exercises to ensure clarity around headcount prioritization.