As YNAB continues to grow, we are looking for an experienced, technically-savvy, Customer Support Rep to join us! This is a full-time, remote position with a schedule that includes one weekend day. We would establish a set weekly schedule that works well for you and the team, but we expect to hire someone who can work their shift between the hours of 9am – 9pm Eastern.
You might be a perfect fit. You’ll know it if you’re somewhat of a YNAB wizard already, you have a background in email or chat support, and you’re known for your ability to explain complicated things in a way anyone can understand.
We love our YNAB customers, and we want to make sure they love their support experience. You’ll look forward to every email and chat message, because it’s an opportunity to help another person gain control of their money and become a better budgeter.
That’s a super-brief intro, and there’s a lot more to it. But first, you need to know if you’ll even like working with us. (We think you will.)
A Bit About Us
We build the best budgeting software around, YNAB or You Need a Budget if you have a lot of extra time on your hands. For more than a decade, people have been using YNAB and then telling their friends what a difference it has made in their lives. (Google us, or read some of our reviews on the App Store, and you’ll see what we mean.) We love building something that has a huge positive impact on people’s lives.
We’re profitable, bootstrapped, and growing. YNAB started in 2004, and we haven’t taken any outside funding—we’re in it for the long haul.
We have one overarching requirement when it comes to joining our team: our Cultural Manifesto has to really click with you. If you’re nodding emphatically while reading it, you’ll probably fit right in, in which case, we can’t wait to hear from you!
First, let’s talk about life at YNAB, and then we’ll go into detail about what we’re looking for.
WHO YOU’D BE WORKING WITH:
Emma is our CS onboarding owner—which means she has the best job ever. She gets to walk you through your interviews, welcome you to the team, and help you get settled in your new role. When not searching for our next support stars, you can find her experimenting in the kitchen, exploring her new city, hanging out with her husband, or dreaming about the beach.
Your manager: Your specific availability will impact what team you’re on and who your manager is, but trust us that they are all incredible! You can look forward to chatting with Jacob about delicious vegetarian restaurants, discussing Hamilton with Janelle, or giggling when Veronica’s horse dog makes an appearance during your weekly meetings. They each bring something unique to the YNAB team, and can’t wait to meet you.
Your team: We have several email and chat teams, each comprised of both full-time and part-time reps. You’ll get to know your new colleagues through the team Slack channels and in regular team meetings where you’ll chat about team goals and projects. While we’ve grown a lot in the last few years, we work hard to maintain a close-knit team culture where everyone is passionate and excited about the work they do.
HOW YOU’LL WORK AT YNAB
We work really hard to make working at YNAB an amazing experience. We have a team full of truly exceptional people—the kind you’ll be excited to work with. Here’s how we operate:
Live Where You Want
We’re a distributed team, so you can live and work wherever you want. Proximity doesn’t influence productivity, and as we continue to increase our global reach, we’d love to have more team members in other timezones to help deliver timely responses to users. Our only requirement is that you have a reliable internet connection and can focus on work during your scheduled shift!
Take Vacation (Seriously)
We want you to take vacation. In fact, we have a minimum vacation policy of three weeks per year (plus two extra weeks for Christmas break). It’s important to get out and do something. We’ll look forward to seeing pictures of your vacation in our internal chat room, creatively named #office_wall.
The YNAB Retreat
We get the full-time team together once a year to catch up on spreadsheets and powerpoints in a Best Western conference room. Just kidding. So far, we’ve done Costa Rica, a gigantic cabin in the mountains, a beach house in the Outer Banks, and a ranch in Montana. We do really fun things, but the highlight is always just hanging out together and having a blast.
UP YOUR GAME
We’re serious about helping you improve your craft. We budget for it (hey-o!). Think conferences, books, dedicated time away from work to learn something new… it’s really up to you and your manager. But we love to see our people growing.
IF YOU’RE INTERNATIONAL…
You’ll be set up as a contractor. Employee or contractor, it’s all the same to us. You’re part of the team. As for time zones, we’re flexible as long as as the shift time works for you.
IF YOU’RE STATESIDE…
You’ll be a W2 employee with fantastic health, dental, and vision insurance, where we cover 100% of the premium for you and your family. (No need to check your vision, you read that right, 100%. Although if you did need to check your vision, no big deal, we’ve got you covered!)
We also have Traditional and Roth 401k options. YNAB contributes three percent whether you choose to throw any money in there or not. It vests immediately. (Are you a personal finance junkie like Jesse? He set up YNAB’s 401k to have the lowest fee structure possible, where all plan costs are paid by YNAB, not your retirement nest egg. The investment funds available are fantastic, passively-managed, ultra low-cost index funds. You’re not a PF junkie? Then trust us, it’s great.)
OTHER TIDBITS
- Once you start, we DEMAND (in a friendly, ALL CAPS IS YELLING way) that you fill out your “Bucket List” spreadsheet with 50 items. (That’s harder than it sounds!)
- The bucket list helps in deciding what we should give you for your birthday and Christmas: No gift cards here. We tried that. Super boring.
- We have a bonus plan based on profitability. You’ll be in on that from day one. YNAB wins, you win. That kind of thing.
- We want you firing on all cylinders so we’ll set you up with a shiny new computer and replace it every three years.
- Did I mention we make a huge, positive difference in people’s lives? We have a Slack channel where we share success stories from our customers daily. It’s amazing. Don’t underestimate this one!
If this sounds like your ideal environment, read on because now we want to talk about you. You will play a big part in helping YNAB delight users and give them control of their money. You will change lives.
Now, back to you, our new Support Rep…
First and foremost, you have customer support experience. You understand the importance of balancing directness, accuracy, personalization and speed, and are comfortable taking on the most difficult conversations. Your past support jobs have given you a great foundation and understanding of the customer experience, and you’re ready to learn from us, while simultaneously teaching the YNAB team something as well.
Not only are you a customer support professional, you’re also incredibly passionate about it. You’ll set aside part of your shift to review conversations, read support-focused books and articles, and dive in to how you can do your job better. You don’t view support as a stepping stone, it is your career, and you’re eager to grow with us.
You love problem solving. You’ll have the impossible task of seeing the forest and the trees. You’ll dive into the depths of a customer’s issue, infer from their (sometimes vague) descriptions of exactly what’s going on, anticipate where they’ll trip up next, and clearly explain what they need to do in order to continue having success with YNAB.
You will be the face of YNAB. You don’t mind answering the same question multiple times in the same day, because it’s a different customer each time—another chance to make someone’s day. You manage to exceed expectations even when you deliver a different answer than the customer was hoping for.
You’re really good at switching gears. You’ll answer three emails in a row—one about how to get a reluctant spouse to budget, the next about a bank not pulling in transactions, and another from a college student who realized they really need a budget for all their pizza and ramen—and not miss a beat.
You know that speed of response is extremely important, but you can walk that fine line between speed and accuracy. You are a master of being direct and friendly within the same sentence, and consistently send a minimum of 10 personalized replies per hour.
You play really nicely with others. You’re flexible. You adapt and adjust. When we implement a new feedback tracking system, it’s your best week ever.
You love to learn. You love constructive feedback because it helps you improve. You pick up conversations mid-stream from a colleague who is off for the weekend, and offer a virtual high-five when the conversation is closed: customer satisfied.
You love taking that one little extra step beyond what’s expected. You’re creative in that way. You consistently force us to ask you questions like, “How did you know the customer meant ‘x’, when he was saying ‘y’ the whole time?”
You’re open minded. While you have support experience, you’re not afraid to learn about how we do things at YNAB. Our team goes above and beyond what’s expected and delivers exceptionally personalized responses, and you’re excited about learning the YNAB support ropes.
A DAY IN THE LIFE…
Our full-time reps spend 30 hours each week answering emails or working in chat support, and 10 hours working on projects, in meetings, and improving their craft. This averages out to 6 hours working with customers, and 2 hours of additional tasks each day. You always know your schedule, because it’s consistent week after week. Let’s say you work Tuesday through Saturday from 12pm – 8pm ET. It’s Wednesday, and you’ve opened your laptop to start your shift. You clock in and spend a few minutes catching up on just the important updates since yesterday (there’s a Slack channel for that).
It’s the first day of the month, so the queue is busier than usual, but expected. To warm up, you hop into a couple of the newest emails. It’s an opportunity to really make someone’s day by getting a response within moments of writing in.
Then, you head to the back of the queue and pick up a couple of the oldest ones. You’re often surprised by the complexity of questions you see, but you’re excited for the challenge each one brings. And you know you can skip the ones beyond your knowledge level, and come back to and review them during your 10 hours of development time each week. They may be above your knowledge level now, but in a few short months you’ll be answering them with ease. In fact, you’ll probably become an expert in one particular area and others will look to you for help.
Today you have your weekly one-to-one with your manager, so you hop on a video call and talk about your metrics, craft goals, and bring up some ideas you have on how to better organize our internal help docs.
After a productive meeting, you wrap up a few conversations, then spend the last hour of your shift outside of the queue. There are a couple new internal knowledge articles on your reading list, and you’re planning to share a post in the #cs_grow channel about a few lessons you learned recently about tone matching.
Before you know it, it’s time to fill out your quick Daily Reflection and clock out!
YOU’RE THE ONE WE’RE LOOKING FOR IF:
- You have at least 2 years experience in an email, chat, or phone support role (required).
- You’ll be able to send at least 10 replies per hour.
- You could flawlessly juggle three live chat conversations at a time.
- You can commit to 40 hours per week, with one shift on Saturday or Sunday
- You value excellence and continuous improvement. At the same time.
- You understand how every support response is an expression of the YNAB culture and brand.
- Other people consider you a stellar communicator.
- You love making people happy.
- People thank you when you deliver difficult news. You’re that good.
- You enjoy trying things you haven’t ever done before.
- You aren’t afraid to ask questions.
- You are wildly productive and independent, but a team-player at heart.
BONUS POINTS:
- You already use and love YNAB.
- You have experience working remotely
And, since our job descriptions are already so long, what’s another sentence or two…
YNAB is an equal opportunity employer. We believe diversity of backgrounds, beliefs, and experiences to be critical to our success and are passionate about creating a welcoming, supportive, and collaborative environment for all employees. All are encouraged to apply as we continue to grow a smart, hard-working, and diverse team who love working together to build something that matters.
How to Apply:
- Apply here (https://ynab.recruiterbox.com/jobs/fk01pyi) by 11:59PM on July 19, 2018. Firm. It’s a real deadline.
- Attach a PDF of your cover letter, and in your cover letter include:
- Why this position is of interest to you, and why you would be a great fit.
- Your secret to great customer support.
- Your answer to the questions: Is the customer always right? Why or why not?
- If you have a prepared resume, attach it in PDF form. If you don’t have a resume because you aren’t even sure you’re looking to change jobs, that’s fine! An informal list of your work and education history are all we’re looking for.
