Founding Chief of Staff (Part-Time / Fractional)

About Norven

Norven is building an independent institution for consequential AI decisions.

We bring together expert human judgement, structured evaluation and disciplined evidence to help organisations make more defensible decisions about whether, where and how AI should operate in high-consequence environments.

We are early-stage, founder-led and ambitious. Our immediate focus is to build our first working product, engage credible design partners and establish the evidence, operating discipline and institutional foundations required to build an enduring company.

The opportunity

We are looking for a high-agency Founding Chief of Staff to work directly with the Founder & CEO and closely with the Founding CTO.

This is a hands-on company-building role for someone who can bring structure, strategic rigour and relentless follow-through to a fast-moving early-stage environment. You will help convert ideas, meetings and emerging opportunities into clear decisions, accountable owners, deadlines and completed work.

You must be as comfortable challenging a strategic assumption as you are personally writing the memo, updating the investor pipeline or closing the follow-up. This is not an Executive Assistant role, a passive advisory position or a pure strategy assignment.

What you will do

• Build and maintain Norven's 90-day operating plan, priorities and company dashboard.
• Run the weekly founder operating rhythm, including the decision log, action register and follow-through.
• Turn complex or incomplete information into concise, decision-ready briefs and recommendations.
• Support founder-led buyer discovery through research, meeting preparation, structured notes, evidence synthesis and next actions.
• Create commercial discipline around prospective design partners, opportunities and stakeholder follow-up.
• Build and maintain the investor CRM, data room, fundraising materials and diligence tracker.
• Coordinate selected priorities across the Founder, Founding CTO, engineers, expert contributors, legal counsel and advisers.
• Support high-priority hiring, candidate assessment and onboarding as the founding team develops.
• Track key dependencies, commitments, risks and resource decisions, working with the relevant specialists.
• Protect founder focus by identifying drift, duplicated effort and unresolved decisions early.

What success looks like in the first 90 days

• Norven has one trusted operating plan, with clear priorities, owners and deadlines.
• Important founder and company decisions are documented and followed through.
• Buyer and design-partner conversations produce structured evidence and timely next steps.
• The investor pipeline and data room are accurate, organised and ready for live diligence.
• The company is operating with greater focus, pace and institutional discipline.

Why join at this stage

• Work directly with the founding team on decisions that will shape the company, product and category.
• Take genuine ownership rather than inheriting a narrow, pre-defined corporate remit.
• Help build the operating foundations of a company addressing an important and fast-developing problem.
• Join through a bounded paid engagement, with the possibility of a deeper role as Norven reaches agreed milestones.

Who we are looking for

You are an intellectually rigorous, entrepreneurial operator who enjoys building from an early stage. You combine strategic judgement with practical execution and are motivated by the opportunity to help create an important company—not simply to advise one.

You will probably bring:

• Significant experience working directly with a founder, CEO or senior leadership team in an early-stage or high-growth business.
• Evidence that you have personally owned cross-functional execution, rather than only advised or coordinated others.
• Exceptional written synthesis and the ability to turn messy, contradictory inputs into a clear decision or action plan.
• Experience across several of the following: company operations, strategy, fundraising, investor diligence, enterprise commercial work, product operations, hiring, governance or programme management.
• The judgement to distinguish facts, assumptions, decisions and open questions while moving at pace.
• High discretion, low ego, dependable follow-through and the confidence to challenge senior people constructively.
• Strong learning velocity, intellectual curiosity and genuine ambition to help build an enduring institution.
• The capacity to commit approximately two days per week, including periodic in-person working sessions in London.

Backgrounds that may translate well

• Chief of Staff or Founder's Associate in a Seed to Series B enterprise technology company.
• Strategy & Operations, Business Operations, Product Operations or Portfolio Operations with genuine start-up execution.
• A consulting, investing or professional-services foundation followed by hands-on operating responsibility.
• Experience in enterprise AI, B2B software, regtech, cybersecurity, fintech or another regulated, procurement-intensive market.
• Building or supporting a pre-seed or seed fundraising process, investor data room or live diligence programme.
• Founding a business, launching a difficult initiative or earning unusual responsibility early in your career.

Our standard is high, but we are not credentialist. Academic or professional excellence can be a useful signal; so can exceptional entrepreneurial achievement, unusual learning velocity or a non-traditional path with clear evidence of impact. What matters most is how well you think, what you have built and what you are prepared to own.

How we work

• Truth before theatre: evidence matters more than presentation.
• Builders, not spectators: we create the artefact, run the test and close the loop.
• First-principles thinking: we challenge assumptions and reason precisely.
• Ownership: we follow work through to a measurable outcome.
• Challenge without ego: direct, respectful disagreement improves decisions.
• Ambition with discipline: we want to build at institutional scale while earning trust through the details.

Working arrangement

• Approximately two days per week for an initial 12-week paid engagement.
• Hybrid working, with periodic in-person founder sessions in London.
• Direct reporting relationship to the Founder & CEO, with a close working relationship with the Founding CTO.
• Structured reviews at weeks four, eight and twelve.
• Potential to develop into a deeper or full-time operating leadership role after agreed commercial or funding milestones, subject to mutual fit. There is no automatic promise of equity, title progression or full-time conversion.

How to apply

Please apply through LinkedIn with your CV and a concise note addressing:

1. What have you personally built, changed or made happen while working directly with a founder or CEO?
2. Why is a hands-on, part-time company-building role at Norven the right opportunity for you now?

Please be specific about what you personally owned and what changed as a result. We value evidence and clarity over polished generalities.

Norven welcomes applications from people of all backgrounds. Selection will be based on relevant evidence, judgement, learning ability, working style and the requirements of the role.