Category Lead, Airbnb Services

Job description

Airbnb was born in 2007 when two hosts welcomed three guests to their San Francisco home, and has since grown to over 5 million hosts who have welcomed over 2 billion guest arrivals in almost every country across the globe. Every day, hosts offer unique stays and experiences that make it possible for guests to connect with communities in a more authentic way. The Community You Will Join: As a Category Lead, you will be the go-to expert for a category within Airbnb Services. You'll develop and carry out the category's growth plan and be accountable for hitting its revenue, conversion and quality targets. You'll lead complex, higher-risk programs, anticipate market and partner trends, and recommend large-scale improvements to product, process and go-to-market. This role is for a seasoned category leader who wants to own outcomes end to end in a new, fast-moving business. A Typical Day: • Category Planning & Performance: Influence the development of the category's roadmap, in line with Services priorities. Track performance against targets and recommend where to focus investment across partners and initiatives. • Strategic Partnerships: Work with the partnerships team to grow the category's most important partner relationships, including joint business plans, commercial discussions and business reviews. Develop account playbooks that can be used to scale. • Program Leadership: Lead complex, higher-risk category programs, such as new partner launches, new sub-categories and changes to pricing or incentives. Set the execution plan and hold cross-functional teams accountable for delivering it. • Analytics & Insights: Build the category's KPI framework and use SQL and financial modeling to size opportunities, diagnose performance and frame trade-offs for leadership. • Cross-Functional Influence: Turn category needs into product requirements and marketing priorities. Earn alignment across Product, Marketing, Operations, Legal and Finance without direct authority. • Market Insight: Spot competitive and partner trends early, and turn them into clear recommendations for leadership. • Team Development: Share knowledge and support the growth of teammates.  Raise the bar on analytical rigor and execution across the team. Your Expertise: • Experience: 10+ years in strategy & operations, business operations, category management, or partnerships, ideally in a marketplace, e-commerce or digital platform business. • Strategic Ownership: A proven track record of setting strategy and delivering measurable top-line and bottom-line growth. • Analytical Skills: Highly analytical, with SQL proficiency required. You can build financial models, size markets and turn complex analyses into clear strategic recommendations. • Influence & Negotiation: Strong executive communication. You've negotiated with and influenced senior stakeholders, both internal and external. • Marketplace Acumen: A deep understanding of two-sided marketplace dynamics (supply quality, traffic, discovery, conversion, retention) and how to pull those levers at category scale. • Program Leadership: Experience leading complex cross-functional programs with meaningful risk and ambiguity. • Leadership: Demonstrated ability to lead without formal authority, such as guiding projects, sharing expertise, and helping colleagues grow. Interest in developing people leadership skills over time is a plus. Your Location: This position is US - Remote Eligible. The role may include occasional work at an Airbnb office or attendance at offsites, as agreed to with your manager. While the position is Remote Eligible, you must live in a state where Airbnb, Inc. has a re