Co-Founder PodForge NY

Co-Founder — PodForge Build the capability. Skip the overhead.

Company PodForge (an A Foundery venture)

Model Human-led Micro GCC — dedicated offshore operating pods

Location New York/New Jersey – United States ·

Primary market: United States

Type Co-Founder — full-time · Start: ASAP

Ownership Up to 45% Equity (milestone and vesting-based)

Compensation

$11,000 stipend across the first three months, with 5% equity allocated on reaching $5,000 MRR.After the first paying customer, a pre agreed salary of $80,000 to $120,000 per year and a defined path to 45% ownership. Vesting and related terms are agreed in the Co-Founder agreement.

The Opportunity in One Line

We’re looking for a commercial founder to build a focused, recurring-revenue company around a proven offshore pod operating model . The delivery engine works. Your job: find the sharpest customer need, win the market’s trust, and build the commercial company around it.

About A Foundery

A Foundery is a profit-led venture studio that partners with operators to build cash-positive companies through focused execution. We don’t chase valuation — we build businesses that survive without funding. We provide the backbone — funding, shared technology, and operations, finance, legal, HR and marketing support — so you can concentrate on customers, revenue and growth.

We handle everything else. You own one thing: the commercial company.

The Customer Problem

Growing US businesses reach a stage where operational execution can’t keep pace with demand. Founders, COOs and functional leaders respond by hiring individuals, adding contractors or spreading work across vendors — and end up with a fragmented operating environment: knowledge trapped with a few people, seniors supervising recurring work, no single accountable owner, drifting quality, and every hire adding management load. Contractors leave delivery management with the customer; outsourcing supplies labor without context; a full offshore entity is more than a mid‑market company needs.

The cost is bigger than payroll: leadership gets consumed by coordination, experienced employees become bottlenecks, and growth adds overhead before it creates leverage. The gap: hiring supplies employees, staffing supplies individuals, software supplies tools, outsourcing supplies task execution — none closes the operating loop across people, process, ownership, quality and governance.

What We Are Building

PodForge provides a Micro GCC — a dedicated offshore operating capability that starts focused and expands as it proves its value. It gives a growing company the leverage of an offshore capability center — without the cost and commitment of building one.

The product — a repeatable pod operating model: defined workflow scope, dedicated team structure, documented procedures and handoffs, quality controls, escalation routes, weekly governance, an operating scorecard, and a path for adding adjacent capabilities. Configurations: Starter (3), Growth (5), Dedicated (8–12 people) — final composition depends on volume, complexity and coverage.

The managed service: PodForge runs the full delivery loop — recruiting, onboarding, SOP alignment, day‑to‑day operations, QA, reporting, weekly reviews and team continuity. Pods operate across customer/service ops, revenue and CRM administration, finance and admin, software engineering / QA / data, commerce (catalog, order, returns) and cross‑functional coordination.

Commercial structure: a monthly retainer per pod or per seat, confirmed through discovery.

Supporting technology: PodForge is not a standalone software product. Pods work inside the customer’s systems — helpdesk, CRM, project management, accounting, commerce and reporting tools. Automation assists with routing, documentation and repetitive steps, but delivery stays human‑led : people own judgment, quality review, escalation and customer context. The Co‑Founder is not expected to build a software platform.

The Value We Sell

PodForge helps customers add operating capacity without equivalent internal headcount, replace fragmented ownership with one accountable pod, free senior employees from recurring admin, turn individual knowledge into documented procedures, keep a flexible cost structure, reduce continuity risk when people change, and let internal teams focus on customers and strategy.

We’re not selling another staffing contract, software dashboard or anonymous outsourcing queue. We sell dependable operating capability — without the customer having to build the entire function internally.

The Unfair Advantage

You don’t start with a blank presentation. You start with experience establishing and operating offshore delivery pods, an existing operations team, real customer and deployment experience, a defined embedded‑pod concept and commercial structure, and A Foundery’s shared company‑building infrastructure.

At this stage, defensibility comes not from proprietary software but from vertical specialization, workflow knowledge, repeatable pod playbooks, recruiting discipline, operating data, and long‑term customer trust. The operating foundation is ready. The repeatable commercial engine still needs to be built — that’s your mandate.

The Co‑Founder Role

Primarily a commercial, market‑building and customer‑owning role, with the two sides split cleanly.

You own — the Commercial Company: market selection and positioning, customer discovery and pipeline, founder‑led sales, commercial packaging, pricing and proposals, pilot design and negotiation, onboarding leadership, executive relationships, retention and expansion, and building the commercial operating system.

A Foundery / the supporting team own — Delivery: recruiting and pod formation, delivery operations, workflow documentation, QA, operational reporting, HR and admin, finance and legal, and technology and marketing support.

You stay accountable for the customer relationship and commercial outcome even when delivery is performed by the supporting team.

Jobs to Be Done

1. Define the wedge — Select the first defensible US segment and the problem PodForge solves most clearly.


2. Validate the problem — Interview buyers; separate urgent, funded needs from general interest.


3. Build the pipeline — Run founder‑led outreach via referrals, partnerships and direct prospecting.


4. Win the first customer — Convert discovery into a paid engagement with defined workflows and success measures.


5. Shape the offer — Turn learning into a simple pod package with clear inclusions and terms.


6. Own onboarding — Align customer, delivery team, access, procedures and governance before launch.


7. Prove value — Set a baseline and demonstrate gains in capacity, reliability, response or effort.


8. Convert and expand — Turn engagements into recurring contracts and expand into adjacent workflows.


9. Own customer success — Maintain executive relationships, resolve concerns, build a retention process.


10. Build the company — Establish the sales playbook, forecast discipline and pricing logic.

First 90 Days

Month 1 — Focus: Select the segment and primary buyer, define the entry‑point workflow, run structured discovery, refine the offer, build a qualified pipeline, and align scope and pricing with delivery.

Month 2 — Sell: Run discovery and solution‑design meetings, produce scoped proposals, validate pricing and delivery assumptions, advance opportunities, define value measurement, and secure a paid pilot.

Month 3 — Prove: Onboard at least one paying customer, establish the delivery and governance cadence, document the first repeatable sales‑to‑delivery process, and build a repeatable approach for the next customer.

The essential 90‑day outcome: at least one paying customer onboarded, and a credible, repeatable path to more.

The Offer

Phase 1, Incubation (first 3 months). An $11,000 stipend while you validate the wedge, build the pipeline and close the first customers.

First equity milestone. 5% ownership allocated on reaching $5,000 MRR. You earn equity by putting revenue on the board, not by signing a document.

Phase 2, After the first paying customer. A pre‑agreed salary of $80,000 to $120,000 per year, set against revenue, cash flow, scope and performance.

Long‑term ownership. A defined path to 45% of LedgerOpsAi, subject to agreed milestones and continued contribution. Vesting, transfer and governance terms are settled in the formal Co‑Founder agreement.

Who Should Consider This

An execution‑led commercial operator who has sold managed services, BPO, offshore teams, GCC or IT services; can earn the trust of US founders, COOs and functional leaders; builds pipeline and closes personally; translates an operating problem into a tightly scoped offer; knows offshore delivery succeeds through process and governance, not just lower‑cost labor; partners with recruiting and operations without taking over their work; prefers customers, evidence and cash flow over presentation‑driven venture building; and wants meaningful ownership in a company they help build.

Why Now

Budget, talent and execution pressure are pushing growing businesses toward managed services and global operating models. Buyers now expect more than cheap headcount — they want accountability, transparent governance and a partner who can run a defined business capability. PodForge has the operating concept and the supporting foundation. The Co‑Founder’s job is to find the sharpest customer need, win the market’s trust, and build the commercial company around it.

PodForge.co is a venture built through A Foundery’s studio model. We build cash‑positive businesses through focused, repeatable execution and real value creation.