As we expand our entrepreneurship team, we are looking for a proactive and creative Operations Lead, who is eager to engage with startups and urban innovation.This role offers a unique opportunity to join a vibrant startup ecosystem and help shape transformative solutions for metropolitan challenges.
Department: Entrepreneurship
Function title: Operations Lead AMS Startup Booster
Working arrangement: 32-40 hours per week
Location: Amsterdam
Role overview
As the Operations Lead for the AMS Startup Booster Program, you’ll assist in managing and growing a dynamic incubation program for urban-tech startups. This role involves supporting the program’s operations, engaging with founders and partners, and contributing to an impactful and seamless participant experience. The Startup Booster Program supports 20 promising urban innovation start-ups every year.
What success looks like
To succeed in this role, you will:
- Successfully manage the AMS Startup Booster independently, with supervision of the Entrepreneurship Lead, fostering high satisfaction levels and positive participant experiences, measured through NPS scores and other KPIs. You will be reporting to the MT member responsible for Innovation & Strategy.
- Build and maintain robust relationships with partners, enhancing the program’s impact and driving renewed collaborations.
- Consistently increase program reach by expanding the number of high-potential applicants and establishing strategic partnerships with each startup cohort.
- Facilitate workshops and events and ensure that these are well-attended and of high quality, with expert speakers, relevant content, and effective facilitation that keeps the energy high and outcomes clear.
Key responsibilities
- Program support: Assist in the day-to-day operations of the AMS Startup Booster, coordinating workshops, events, and other program activities.
- Participant journey: Contribute to creating a smooth user journey from application to post-program follow-up, collaborating with AMS teams to connect participants to valuable resources.
- Network engagement: Coordinate with experts, mentors, and speakers to ensure their participation adds meaningful value to the program and effectively supports startups.
- Resource management: Help develop tools and processes, including scheduling, data collection, and feedback management, to optimize program efficiency.
- Partnership collaboration: Work with the Entrepreneurship team to identify potential collaborators who can support the program through mentorship, expertise, or funding.
- Acquisition support: Collaborate with the Communications and Entrepreneurship team to develop outreach strategies and attract high-potential applicants.
- Community engagement: Support AMS community events and expand our expert and speaker network, contributing to the program’s visibility and reach.
- Event planning & execution: Contribute to organizing and executing key entrepreneurship events such as the AMS Open Entrepreneurship series, Demo Days, and networking meetups—ensuring high-quality experiences for participants and strengthening the program’s presence within the Amsterdam innovation ecosystem.
Who are you?
- Experience: approximately 3 years in a similar role within a startup incubator, accelerator, or program support environment.
- Skills: Strong at managing partner relationships and organizing materials (e.g. shared folders, decks). Comfortable using simple contact tracking tools and project management platforms like Asana, Trello, or Notion.
- Mindset: Detail-oriented, self-starting, and highly organized, willing to learn and adapt as you gain experience.
- Communication: Strong interpersonal skills and the ability to confidently engage with startup founders, partners, and mentors — whether that's leading conversations, collecting feedback, or reaching out proactively to build new connections.
- Collaborative & Independent: A team player who can work independently on tasks while building positive relationships with all relevant stakeholders (internal & external).
What we offer
- Professional growth: This role offers a supportive environment for growth, providing you with hands-on experience and the autonomy to contribute ideas and improvements to the AMS Startup Booster and the general entrepreneurship activities of AMS Institute.
- Experienced team: Join a passionate and experienced team that’s actively shaping Amsterdam’s startup and innovation scene. Work directly with the other program leads, learn from peers and contribute to a purpose-driven institute that works on innovation to create better cities
- 32-40 hours per week (0,8 – 1,0 FTE)
- Salary scale 10, depending on experience, and based on the salary table of the CLA Nederlandse Universiteiten
- 8% holiday allowance
- 8,3% year-end allowance
- Enjoy a healthy work-life balance with 328 hours of paid leave per year (based on 1,0 FTE) - this is more than 8 weeks!
- An excellent pension scheme with ABP
- NS business card when using public transportation for your home-office commute/compensation for travel allowance when not using public transport.
About Us
AMS Institute is a unique transdisciplinary urban innovation ecosystem, rooted in its founding institutes TU Delft, Wageningen University & Research, and MIT, and shaped by its partnership with the City of Amsterdam. As a thought leader, accelerator, and learning community, we develop groundbreaking scientific insights, imaginative solutions, and impactful technologies. We research critical and interconnected challenges in mobility, energy, circularity, digitalization, food and climate adaptation to accelerate the development of tangible metropolitan solutions.
We orchestrate innovation for urban transformation by providing a collaborative space where cities and leading tech universities learn and experiment together. We act as a springboard for the next generation of urban innovators. Immersed in Amsterdam as our real-world lab we research, design and share metropolitan solutions for cities around the globe.
We are a team of engineers, researchers, entrepreneurs, students, program developers, facilitators, and employees of the municipality. Together we close the gap between society and science on a daily basis. We are a community of about eighty open-minded, motivated, social nerds.
When you work at AMS Institute, you do work that matters. Few things are fixed and there are many possibilities, giving you the flexibility to organize your own work.
Procedure
Are you interested? Send your motivation and CV by email to vacatures@AMS-institute.org by June 20, 2025.