Finance Lead

About Sherlock

Sherlock believes that access to a sound currency and a functioning financial system should be basic human rights. Sherlock’s mission is to help create an open, uncensorable financial system that is secure enough for billions of people to trust with their life savings. 

Traditional blockchain security reviews are a good start, but it’s not enough. That's why Sherlock provides protocols with state-of-the-art, incentive-aligned audit contests, bug bounties and AI auditing.

Sherlock’s audit contests combine the best of traditional auditing with a competitive twist that results in hundreds of eyes (and AIs) looking at a codebase and some of the best security experts in the world surfacing issues that traditional audits miss. 

Sherlock is the leader in auditing, running more public audits than any other provider last year. Ethereum, Ripple, Aave, Morpho, Tempo and the biggest crypto teams in the world choose Sherlock for their security needs.

Join Sherlock’s elite team on the ground floor, backed by some of the best Web3 and Silicon Valley VC firms such as Alliance, Archetype, IDEO, CoinFund, Lattice, Spartan, A Capital, and many others. 

Sherlock's Culture

Sherlock's culture is fast-moving, intense, and not right for everyone. Here are some common attributes among historically successful team members at Sherlock:

Mission-focus
Anyone in this for reasons other than creating the best financial coordination mechanism in history will either get too demotivated to last through multi-year bear markets or get too distracted during the frothy bull markets.

Willingness to work long, hard and smart
If Sherlock has any advantage, it is the willingness to work harder and think with more discipline than anyone else. This includes thinking from first principles about all important decisions and always thinking in tradeoffs and bets. 

Owner mentality
Team members get ownership in Sherlock after a short time in this role, and each is expected to act like an owner of a Michelin-star restaurant where no detail is too small.

Builder mentality
Everyone at Sherlock is deep in the arena getting their hands dirty and this is a vulnerable position. There are no pure "idea people" or pure managers at Sherlock; everyone is in execution mode first and foremost.

Customer focus
It is too easy to sit behind a computer and build in an echo chamber. We must go out of our way to experience the customer's viewpoint as often as possible.

Professional athlete mentality
Professional athletes opt in to a high-performance, meritocratic culture. This creates an environment that brings out the best in people and rewards each for their respective performance. But it's also an environment where being in the 70th percentile in your role means you will have a short tenure on the team.

Comfort with directness and transparency
You should be comfortable giving direct feedback to others and receiving direct feedback yourself. "Not ruffling feathers" comes at the expense of moving in a suboptimal direction for too long. Sherlock is extremely transparent internally (and with customers) which means you can get involved in decisions made in any part of Sherlock. 

The Role

We are looking for a Finance Lead to own our finance, accounting, tax, payroll, and treasury operations, and to help shape the financial decisions that guide the business.

This role blends strategic finance work, such as forecasting and pricing, with the hands-on execution needed to keep a fast-moving company running smoothly across both traditional finance and digital assets. It is a very hands-on role where you will wear multiple hats. 

What You Will Do

Financial Planning and Analysis

• Track current cash balances across on-chain and off-chain accounts
• Build and maintain financial models and projections, including profit forecasts
• Analyze key business metrics and how they change over time to inform decision making
• Contribute to pricing strategy and implementation for new and existing products

Accounting and Financial Reporting

• Work with bookkeepers to provide the information needed for monthly financial statements
• Manage the monthly close with our external accounting provider, review the statements they prepare, and reconcile them against internal records
• Investigate discrepancies between internal and external statements to keep financials as accurate as possible
• Support Sherlock’s ongoing transition from cash to accrual accounting

Tax and Compliance

• Coordinate state and federal tax filings with our external accountants
• Manage payments to tax agencies, including estimated payments throughout the year
• Partner with our accounting firm through the tax preparation and filing process
• Support tax matters across multiple jurisdictions, including international entities
• Oversee ongoing tax compliance and help ensure the financial records behind filings are accurate

Treasury and Payments

• Execute payments through payroll platforms and other transfer channels
• Manage general money movement, including intercompany transfers between on-chain and off-chain accounts
• Coordinate with bookkeepers to ensure all fund movements are properly recorded
• Track on-chain transactions across categories such as accounts receivable, accounts payable, controllership, and fund management

HR and Payroll

• Manage hiring logistics, including setting up contracts in HR and payroll platforms such as Deel and Rippling
• Facilitate signing of employment agreements and collect the information needed to set up employment profiles
• Run payroll across multiple platforms and payment methods, including fiat and on-chain stablecoins
• Manage payroll tax compliance across a variety of state tax authorities, including withholding, paid family leave, and state medical contributions

Operations

• Onboard new team members by provisioning access to internal tools and workspaces (for example, Google Workspace, Slack, Notion, Discord, Trello, Figma, and Fireflies)
• Manage offboarding, including removing access when team members depart
• Manage ownership vesting schedules for employees and investors
• Monitor entity mail and handle other operational tasks as needed

What We Are Looking For

• Trustworthiness (10x weight)
• Competence (9x weight)
• Ability to wear many hats (8x weight)
• Organized and detail-oriented (8x weight)
• Strong understanding of finance and accounting, at least some classes in university or previous job experience in these areas (8x weight)
• Meaningful understanding of crypto/blockchain (7x weight)

Nice to Haves

• Experience at a startup, ideally in the crypto or web3 industry
• Professional background in finance and/or accounting
• Familiarity with US and international multi-entity corporate structures
• Experience interfacing with tax, accounting and/or bookkeeping professionals

What's in It for You

• Competitive base salary (flexible in fiat/crypto)
• Meaningful equity/token upside in a high-growth Web3 leader
• Fully remote with flexible hours across timezones
• Travel to premier crypto conferences and offsites in destinations like Cannes, Dubai, and Singapore
• Contribute directly to securing the future of decentralized finance
• Root-level influence: work directly with the CEO/founder, shape pricing strategy, and build in a mission-driven, elite team
• Comprehensive benefits, including top-tier health/dental coverage

This is a pivotal role encompassing vital areas of a fast-growing Web3 company. You will wear many hats but have an ability to lean into the areas that you find most interesting/impactful. You will also gain a unique vantage point on the most important areas of running a successful business alongside the CEO, with access to data/information that few roles offer. The role title is flexible if there is a reasonable alternative title you prefer.