Direct Hire

Director, Strategic Finance

Merlin Labs · Boston

Metro: Boston, MA
Craft: eVTOL
Job Type: Business & Corporate

About the role

About Merlin:

Merlin is a venture backed aerospace startup building a non-human pilot to enable both reduced crew and uncrewed flight. Backed by some of the world’s leading investors, Merlin is scaling alongside our customers to begin leveraging autonomy today to solve some of aviation’s biggest challenges.

About You:

You are a finance leader with 12+ years of progressive senior FP&A or strategic finance experience, ideally with real exposure to program-based finance (Estimate At Completion, cost-type contracts, and rate structures). You've spent your career as a builder, not just a maintainer: you've personally designed cost-tracking frameworks, financial models, and process workflows.

You are equally comfortable in a spreadsheet and in a room full of engineers or program managers and are able to translate an ambiguous technical roadmap into a hiring plan, a budget, and a forecast leadership can act on and track against. You don't need a fully-formed process handed to you; you build it, test it, and iterate.

What should excite you about this role: it is a rare two-phase opportunity. Near-term, you build the financial infrastructure for Merlin's Programs and Engineering organizations from the ground up. Long-term, that build converts into full P&L ownership of a product line: a genuine path from builder to business owner.

Responsibilities:

Design and implement FP&A processes for engineering headcount, program costs, R&D spend, and capital allocation

Build financial models that translate engineering roadmaps into resource plans, hiring forecasts, budget commitments, and strategic scenarios

Partner with Engineering and Program Management to enhance our program cost accounting framework: cost tracking and reporting, cost-to-complete reporting, etc.

Define chart-of-accounts conventions, cost center structures, and reporting hierarchies that support program-level visibility

Create the monthly/quarterly operating cadence: actuals reviews, variance analysis, and re-forecast processes for the Programs and Engineering organizations

Deliver reporting and analytics that give leadership real-time insight into burn, capacity, and program financial health

Support the implementation of financial planning tools and systems in partnership with Finance and IT

Support the build and delivery of the annual operating plan and budget

Assume full P&L ownership for an assigned product line, including revenue, gross margin, and operating expense (long-term)

Drive pricing strategy, make-vs.-buy decisions, and resource allocation in partnership with the product line GM (long-term)

Qualifications:

12+ years of progressive finance experience in FP&A, Strategic Finance, or finance business partner roles

Fluent in program finance concepts: EAC, cost-type contracts, and rate structures

Track record of influencing technical leaders through clear financial storytelling

Hands-on builder: has designed and implemented processes and models from scratch

BA/BS in Accounting, Finance, or related field required

Nice to Haves:

Background at a defense, aerospace, SaaS, or hardware-intensive technology company

Costpoint experience

MBA or CPA

This position is based on-site at Merlin HQ in Boston, MA.

Once you’re here, you’ll enjoy a variety of on-site perks designed to make your workday enjoyable and convenient. These include catered lunches featuring a rotating menu of delicious options, an assortment of snacks to keep you fueled throughout the day, and a selection of beverages, including coffee, tea, and other drinks, to keep you refreshed.

Our goal is to create an environment where you can thrive both professionally and personally

Merlin Labs offers an innovative, entrepreneurial, and team-focused startup environment. We also offer a top-notch benefits package (health, dental, life, unlimited vacation, and 401k with match) and work/life integration. Being part of the Merlin team allows you to become part of a small team that supports professional development while working together to achieve our mission.