Principal Product Manager, Payments

Gusto, Inc.•Los Angeles, CA

1d•$179,000 - $263,000•Hybrid

About The Position

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. By the Numbers: Named #1 best software for small business of 2024 by G2 2,700+ employees in the United States, Canada, Mexico, and Turkiye and growing Over $500M in annual revenue The SMB market is large (and growing!) with huge opportunities for Gusto to make an incredible impact for SMBs What Product Management is like at Gusto: We’re looking for high-autonomy, entrepreneurial Product Managers to come build high-impact solutions for small businesses and their employees. We believe in high-ownership Product Managers who operate like business owners - owning an entire roadmap end to end and shipping product all the way from strategy through to the nitty gritty details (some describe this kind of role as a “GM” type role). Our Product team is lean, which means you’ll have a high degree of impact and ownership. We’re here to serve small and medium businesses. Gusto has a strong mission-driven culture, and we care deeply about lifting up these business owners. About the Team: Gusto moves hundreds of billions of dollars per year. The Product Manager, Financial Data will be responsible for building technology that helps expand and develop payment rails and payment methods across the globe to enable money movement and solidify our customer ledger and reconciliation platforms for reliability. This role is part of the Payments team at Gusto that ensures that our 400,000+ small and medium businesses and millions of their employees are getting paid on time, every time. You will be developing our payments systems that are foundational to the payment solutions offered by Gusto. You will work closely with a team of Engineers and Designers, to build the roadmap, set strategic priorities, and ensure the successful implementation of our payments stack. We are seeking a highly motivated Product Manager to lead the development and implementation of our financial ledger system and transaction reconciliation process. This critical role will be instrumental in strengthening our internal controls, ensuring data integrity, and maintaining our commitment to financial transparency and regulatory compliance as we continue to scale.

Requirements

8+ years of product management experience, with a proven track record of successfully delivering complex financial or compliance-focused software products.
Strong understanding of financial accounting principles, general ledger systems, and transaction lifecycle.
Deep knowledge of GAAP and PCAOB compliance requirements and experience in building systems that meet them is essential.
Proficiency in SQL
Experience with building and optimizing transaction reconciliation processes, ideally in a high-volume environment.
Familiarity with the payroll industry and its unique financial complexities is highly desirable.
Excellent analytical skills with the ability to translate complex business problems into clear, concise product requirements.
Exceptional communication, interpersonal, and presentation skills, with the ability to influence and collaborate effectively with diverse teams.
Proven ability to manage multiple priorities in a fast-paced, dynamic environment.
Bachelor's degree in Business, Finance, Computer Science, or a related field.

Nice To Haves

Ideally, holds a CPA, CFA, or CMA certification.
Experience working at a fintech company, particularly in the payroll or payments space.
Experience with enterprise-grade accounting software (e.g., NetSuite, SAP, Oracle Financials).
Experience with data analytics tools and reporting platforms.
Familiarity with IT General Controls (ITGC) and best practices, including role-based access control (RBAC) and segregation of duties (SoD).

Responsibilities

Ownership: You will own the roadmap for building a scalable and compliant ledger system for tracking money movement at Gusto.
North Star: Your goal is to build a system that is accurate and compliant that continues to ensure our reputation as a trusted party with customers, regulators, and partners.
Collaborate: You will work closely with our application teams, accounting, engineering, and data team to drive the roadmap.
Product Strategy & Roadmap: Define and champion the product vision, strategy, and roadmap for the ledger system and transaction reconciliation processes. This includes understanding internal stakeholder needs (Finance, Audit, Legal), regulatory requirements (GAAP, SOX), and industry best practices.
Requirements Gathering & Prioritization: Conduct in-depth analysis of current financial workflows, identify control gaps, and translate complex regulatory requirements into clear, actionable product specifications and user stories. Prioritize features based on business impact, risk mitigation, and development effort.
System Thinking: Collaborate closely with engineering, finance, and internal audit teams to design and build a scalable, reliable, and auditable ledger system. This includes defining end to end transaction flows, data models, integration points with existing systems (e.g., payroll processing, general ledger), and reporting capabilities.
Transaction Reconciliation Ownership: Develop and implement a comprehensive and automated transaction reconciliation system to ensure accuracy and completeness across all financial transactions. This includes defining reconciliation and classification rules, identifying discrepancies, and establishing clear workflows for investigation and resolution.
Regulatory Compliance & Audit Support: Ensure the developed systems and processes meet all relevant SOX requirements and other applicable financial regulations. Act as the primary product liaison during internal and external audits, providing documentation and explanations as needed.
IT General Controls (ITGC) Integration: Work closely with IT and audit teams to incorporate ITGC best practices, including role-based access control (RBAC), segregation of duties (SoD), change management, and logical access controls, into the design and functionality of the compliance ledger and reconciliation systems.
Partner Management: Model a collaboration and deep customer empathy while communicating product plans, progress, and challenges to a diverse set of stakeholders, including executive leadership, finance, engineering, legal, and audit teams. Foster strong collaborative relationships across departments.
Performance Monitoring & Optimization: Define key performance indicators (KPIs) for the ledger and reconciliation systems. Monitor performance, identify areas for improvement, and drive continuous optimization.
Risk Management: Proactively identify potential risks related to financial data integrity and compliance, and develop mitigation strategies within the product roadmap.
Applied AI Usage: Develop automated accounting reconciliation systems that streamline and enhance manual tasks.