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The Athletic Media Company

Posted 13 days ago

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Manager, Commercial Strategy and Finance (New York)

New YorkHybridFull-time

AI Summary

Manages complex commercial initiatives and partnerships at The Athletic, combining financial modeling, deal negotiation, and post-close performance tracking to drive high-value advertising and licensing strategy.

About this role

About Us
Powered by one of the largest global newsrooms in sports media, The Athletic brings sports fans the most comprehensive stories about the teams, sports and athletes they love. The Athletic’s newsroom of 500+ full-time staff delivers in-depth coverage of hundreds of professional and college teams across more than 47 North American markets and all 20 football clubs in the English Premier League, as well as many Championship clubs.

About the Role


The Athletic is looking for a Manager, Commercial Strategy and Finance to serve as the primary architect and steward of our most complex and high-value commercial initiatives and partnerships. This is a high-visibility role that sits at the intersection of business development, strategy, deal-making, and operational rigor; it is a hybrid role based in New York City, reporting into a Vice President of Advertising Finance.

We are looking for a "dual-threat" professional: someone who has a deep reverence for analytical rigor, paired with a commercially-minded approach that helps guide projects and deals to success. You will be the quantitative engine driving our commercial strategy; not just evaluating ideas before launch and deals before they are signed; but rigorously tracking performance once they are live.

This is a hybrid role and will require 3 days / week in office for candidates in the greater New York City Metropolitan area.

Responsibilities

  • Commercial planning and analysis: You will translate dense financial data and analysis into high-impact visual narratives for discussions with The Athletic’s leadership team. You'll articulate the "why" behind every major investment.
  • Modeling and evaluation: Build clean, flexible financial models to value complex and integrated deals and commercial initiatives across licensing and advertising, as well as other revenue streams.
  • Deal construction: Analyze and aid in negotiation of deal mechanics, focusing on minimum guarantees (MGs), revenue shares, and recoupment schedules. You will partner closely with Legal and Accounting to ensure term sheets translate into sound financial realities.
  • Post-close performance tracking: Own the "full-lifecycle" of the deal. Once a partnership is live, you are on the hook for tracking actuals vs. benchmarks, managing P&L impact, and providing the FP&A oversight needed to course-correct or double-down.
  • Forecasting and variance analysis: Integrate live deal performance into our broader rolling forecasts, explaining variances to leadership and identifying trends in audience monetization and rights costs.

    • Requirements

  • 5+ years of experience in corporate development, strategic finance, consulting or investment banking.
  • Analytically rigorous individual with experience performing high stakes evaluation of potential deals, ideally including content licensing.
  • Deep understanding of the leverage points in a negotiation; can anticipate how a legal clause might impact a financial outcome.
  • Someone who understands the value of accuracy; whether it's a pre-deal valuation or a post-deal performance report, you own the numbers from start to finish.
  • Genuinely motivated by The Athletic’s mission; you understand the value of premium sports journalism and the gravity of the shifting media landscape.
  • Expert-level financial modeling.
  • Strong executive presentation development skills.
  • Deep understanding of commercial deal terms, negotiations, and deal processes.
  • Experience with key FP&A processes (budgeting, forecasting, and variance analysis).
  • BS in Finance/Economics, MBA a plus.

    • Skills

    Advertising FinanceBudgetingContent LicensingDeal NegotiationExcelExecutive PresentationFinancial ModelingForecastingFP&AMinimum GuaranteesP&L ManagementPowerPointRecoupment SchedulesRevenue SharesVariance Analysis

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