Growth Partnerships Manager, Startups (12 Month Fixed Term Contract)

Location: San Francisco, United States; hybrid with required office attendance 1–2 times per week

Salary: $185,000–$245,000 USD per year

Company

Canva is a design platform focused on helping people and organizations create and experience visual content.

What you will do

• Run Canva for Startups end to end across the startup ecosystem, working with accelerators, venture capital firms, and startup communities.
• Build and manage program mechanics, including tiered offers, coupon administration, startup verification, cohort onboarding, and partner-specific experiences.
• Track startup program performance from portfolio penetration and offer redemption through activation and conversion.
• Represent Canva at founder events, workshops, demo days, and accelerator cohorts while developing ecosystem relationships.
• Source, structure, negotiate, and launch distribution partnerships across banks, fintechs, telcos, and OEMs.
• Coordinate with Product, Marketing, Legal, Finance, Growth, and Strategy to launch partnerships and deliver channel outcomes.

Requirements

• 5+ years of experience in partnerships, business development, growth, or ecosystem roles within a startup or consumer/B2B technology environment.
• Deep understanding of the startup ecosystem and experience working with venture capital firms, accelerators, startup communities, or similar partners.
• Proven ownership of partnership deals, including opportunity sourcing, strategy and business case development, negotiation, and closing.
• Ability to build and scale programs, establish operating cadences, measure results, and manage broad portfolios.
• Strong cross-functional operating skills and the ability to build new processes from 0 to 1.
• Ability to commute to the San Francisco office 1–2 times per week.

Nice to have

• Experience as a founder or at a venture capital firm or accelerator.
• Experience building a startup or ecosystem program from scratch.
• Experience closing consumer or SMB distribution partnerships.

Culture & Benefits

• Hybrid work model with flexibility in how and where work is performed within the role’s San Francisco office requirements.
• Virtual interviews.
• Reasonable interview-process adjustments are available upon request.
• Fixed-term employment for 12 months.

Hiring process

• Interviews are conducted virtually.
• Candidates are asked to provide their pronouns and any reasonable adjustments needed during the interview process.