IT Manager

About us
Sparrow is the first high-tech, high-touch employee leave management solution. Our mission is to make it simple for companies to provide their employees with all kinds of leave (i.e. family, medical, etc.).
Currently, the leave management process is painful and inefficient for everyone. Company leaders struggle to keep up with regulations and processes that change frequently, and the employees going on leave are overwhelmed by bureaucracy at an exceptionally important juncture in their career. Sparrow transforms this ordinarily tedious, error-prone, complex to remain compliant, and time-consuming process into a 30-minute end-to-end experience saving teams time (20 - 40 hours per leave) and money (up to 30K per leave).
Sparrow is headquartered in San Francisco with remote employees across the country. Sparrow is a diverse, highly talented, and supportive team. Together, we are hardworking, collaborative, smart, and humble-after all, we're solving real problems.
About the role
This role initially reports to the General Counsel and will be Sparrow's first dedicated IT professional. As such, you will be a founding member of Sparrow's Legal, Security, and Compliance team as well as an important cross-functional operator. This is a "player coach" role for a fast-growing SaaS company looking for someone with both IT expertise and the ability to draw upon past experience to roll up their sleeves and deploy the tactics and strategies they think best under constantly developing circumstances.
Here's what you'll do

• We're looking for an accomplished IT professional who has experience scaling a company's IT function. In this role, you'll be a subject matter expert in information technology including IT systems and related risk management.
• You will manage Sparrow's IT operations, ensuring the availability, performance, and security of our systems. In this regard, you will handle the maintenance, configuration, and troubleshooting of our IT infrastructure, including networks, servers, and software applications. This will include your hands-on support of a fully distributed employee base and their IT-related questions.
• To enable Sparrow to continue scaling intentionally, you will develop and manage IT policies, processes, and best practices to ensure compliance with industry standards and any regulatory requirements.
• You also will collaborate with People Operations to oversee onboarding and offboarding procedures for employees within a fully distributed workforce, and for developing processes that can effectively build and operationalize this program at scale.
• Further, you will centralize the procurement of IT hardware and software for Sparrow, including tracking contract renewal dates for software and licenses in collaboration with various divisional stakeholders.
• A trusted advisor, you will cultivate strong relationships across teams, including with PeopleOps, Engineering, CX, and Legal, Security and Compliance to define IT requirements and ensure the successful and compliant implementation of technology initiatives.
• Relatedly, you will collaborate with Sparrow's Security team to help ensure the implementation and maintenance of robust security measures, including access controls, data protection, authentication and identity management, and data backup and recovery strategies.
• We expect someone in this role to stay abreast of developments in technology and the broader industry, and to identify opportunities for Sparrow to leverage new technologies to improve its operations.

About you

• You are self-motivated and able to work autonomously, but comfortable asking questions and speaking up when you're blocked or need help.
• You are curious, appropriately analytical (but not subject to analysis paralysis) and have excellent professional judgment. You see problem solving as an opportunity not a challenge, and are proactive. You therefore actively engage in brainstorming and present options and recommendations for discussion.
• You are proficient at evaluating risks, identifying key priorities, and executing against those priorities with clear and effective project management. You are an organized planner.
• You are receptive to inquiries and feedback about your work, assume good intentions, and value being part of a team. Similarly, you enjoy mentoring other team members and will be a key contributor to team culture.
• You are a prepared and thoughtful communicator who is able to convey complex concepts to non-technical audiences.
• You are a trustworthy and professional ambassador for Sparrow when engaging with third parties, including vendors.
• You have experience with change management and fast-growth organizations that you can draw upon to help ensure Sparrow is building scalable practices.
• 7+ years of experience in Information Technology and IT infrastructure, including prior experience scaling IT in startup environments.
• SaaS experience and experience with cloud-based SaaS applications like SSO, Google Workspace, Zoom, and others. You also are familiar with helpdesk ticketing software, such as JIRA.
• Expert in macOS devices and strong knowledge of AWS and relevant cloud technologies.
• IT experience in the context of supporting SOC 2 and ISO certifications and other common compliance frameworks.

Why Sparrow?
Our work at Sparrow is impactful. We help People teams with one of the hardest parts of their job, and we support employees at a time when they need it most. We're driven by our mission, much like a nonprofit, but with the resources and scale of a fast-growing venture-backed company.
Sparrow is proud to be an equal opportunity employer. While we are united by our excitement for the mission and product, the diversity of our experiences is one of our strengths. The Sparrow team is made up of people with all types of backgrounds, and we have teammates in 30 states and counting. To learn more about the Sparrow team and its benefits, check out our careers page.