Technical Communications & Storytelling Lead

What You'll Do Role Summary   Avalara is at an inflection point in how we evolve and scale our platform, products, and technical strategy. As the complexity of our architecture and the pace of innovation increase, the gap between what is being built and how it is understood—internally and externally—also grows.   This role exists to close that gap.   The Technical Communications & Storytelling Lead operates as an extension of the CTO, who leads global Engineering, IT, Content, Security, Onboarding, Managed Services, Professional Services, and Customer Support departments at Avalara. His teams design and operate the technology and services that power the Avalara agentic AI platform for global tax and compliance, focusing on product innovation, integration, reliability, and customer experience. ensuring that Avalara’s technical strategy, platform evolution, and product direction are translated into clear, consistent, and decision-enabling narratives. This is critical to driving alignment across Engineering, Product, Customer teams and leadership, and to effectively communicate our strategy in high-stakes forums including board discussions, executive reviews, and customer engagements.   How This Role Elevates Avalara   Drives clarity and alignment on technical strategy across Product, Engineering, Customer Support and executive leadership    Strengthens how Avalara communicates platform evolution, innovation, and product capabilities to internal and external audiences    Improves the effectiveness and impact of CTO-level communications in high-stakes moments    Connects technical investments to business outcomes, enabling stronger prioritization and decision-making    Establishes a higher standard and scalable approach to technical storytelling across the organization    What Your Responsibilities Will Be Responsibilities Create alignment through narrative:  Develop and own CTO-level narratives that clearly articulate technical strategy, platform direction, and product evolution, enabling faster and more effective decision-making    Translate complexity into clarity:  Convert complex technical concepts, architectures, and product capabilities into structured, accessible, and high-impact communications    Enable executive communication:  Produce presentations, written narratives, and talk tracks that elevate the quality and consistency of executive-level messaging    Connect technology to impact:  Frame technical work in terms of business value, customer outcomes, and strategic priorities    Identify and close clarity gaps:  Proactively surface inconsistencies, ambiguity, or misalignment in technical messaging and drive resolution    Scale storytelling capability:  Establish frameworks, templates, and best practices that elevate technical communication across teams    Bridge technical and business audiences:  Tailor messaging to engineers, executives, and external stakeholders without sacrificing accuracy or depth    Increase velocity through tooling:  Leverage AI and modern tools to accelerate synthesis, iteration, and delivery of high-quality content    Partner with internal communication leaders:  Ensure all messaging is consistent with communications developed and shared by other communications teams internally and externally.   12-Month Success Signals   CTO and senior leadership consistently rely on this role for high-stakes communications, including board materials, executive reviews, and external engagements    Technical strategy and platform narratives are clearly understood and consistently articulated across Product, Engineering, Customer Support and leadership teams    Noticeable reduction in rework and misalignment driven by unclear or inconsistent technical messaging    Executive communications demonstrate a step-change in clarity, structure, and impact    Repeatable storytelling frameworks are adopted across teams, improving quality and efficiency at scale    Technical investments are more consistently linked to measurable business outcomes in leadership discussions    Increased speed from concept to communication, without degradation in accuracy or quality    What You’ll Need To Be Successful Bar Raiser Expectations   We are hiring a Bar Raiser - someone who elevates the clarity, quality, and effectiveness of how technical strategy is communicated and understood across the organization. This role is expected to strengthen how decisions are made by improving the way complex technical work is translated into clear, actionable narratives.   A successful candidate will:   Raise the standard for technical communication across Product, Engineering, and executive leadership   Improve decision-making quality by ensuring technical concepts are clearly understood and consistently framed   Reduce misalignment and rework by identifying and resolving ambiguity in technical messaging   Elevate team capability by establishing repeatable storytelling frameworks and best practices   Strengthen cross-functional alignment by bridging technical and business audiences effectively   Leave communication systems, frameworks, and organizational clarity measurably stronger   AI Bar Raiser Expectations     We are hiring an AI Bar Raiser - someone who brings applied AI expertise and uses it to meaningfully improve how technical communication and storytelling are produced and scaled. This role is expected to elevate how AI is used across the organization to accelerate clarity, improve decision-making, and increase the speed and quality of communication.   A successful candidate will:   Use AI to significantly accelerate synthesis of complex technical inputs into clear narratives   Deliver measurable improvements in communication speed, quality, and consistency   Build and scale AI-driven workflows that reduce manual effort across storytelling processes   Elevate how teams use AI for communication , not just individual output   Establish repeatable patterns for AI-assisted content development   Apply strong judgment to ensure accuracy, context, and integrity in AI-generated content   Qualifications Educational requirement:  Bachelor's degree in Engineering, Computer Science, Communications, or a related field.   8–12 years of experience in engineering, technical product development, technical communications, or a related field    Strong understanding of how software systems and platforms are built, including architecture, APIs, and system design concepts    Demonstrated ability to quickly build deep context and explain products and systems at both functional and technical levels    Exceptional writing and storytelling skills, with a track record of simplifying complex topics without losing critical nuance    Advanced PowerPoint and visual communication skills, with strong command of narrative structure and flow    Experience supporting executive-level communications, including presentations and talk tracks for senior leaders    Proven ability to operate in ambiguous, fast-paced environments and drive clarity across cross-functional stakeholders    Strong collaboration and influence skills across Engineering, Product, and executive teams    Demonstrated ability to leverage AI and modern tools to enhance productivity and output quality    Avalara is an AI-first Company AI is embedded in our workflows, decision-making, and products.  Success here requires embracing AI as an essential capability. You’ll bring experience using AI and AI-related technologies, ready to thrive here. You’ll apply AI every day to business challenges - improving efficiency, contributing solutions, and driving results for your team, our company, and our customers. You’ll grow with AI by staying curious about new trends and best practices, and by sharing what you learn so others can benefit too. How We’ll Take Care Of You Total Rewards  In addition to a great compensation package, paid time off, and paid parental leave, many Avalara employees are eligible for bonuses.  Health & Wellness   Benefits vary by location but generally include private medical, life, and disability insurance.  Inclusive culture and diversit y  Avalara strongly supports diversity, equity, and inclusion, and is committed to integrating them into our business practices and our organizational culture. We also have a total of 8 employee-run resource groups, each with senior leadership and exec sponsorship.  What You Need To Know About Avalara We’re defining the relationship between tax and tech. We’ve already built an industry-leading cloud compliance platform, processing over 54 billion customer API calls and over 6.6 million tax returns a year. Our growth is real - we're a billion dollar business - and we’re not slowing down until we’ve achieved our mission - to be part of every transaction in the world. We’re bright, innovative, and disruptive, like the orange we love to wear. It captures our quirky spirit and optimistic mindset. It shows off the culture we’ve designed, that empowers our people to win. We’ve been different from day one. Join us, and your career will be too. We’re An Equal Opportunity Employer Supporting diversity and inclusion is a cornerstone of our company — we don’t want people to fit into our culture, but to enrich it. All qualified candidates will receive consideration for employment without regard to race, color, creed, religion, age, gender, national orientation, disability, sexual orientation, US Veteran status, or any other factor protected by law. If you require any reasonable adjustments during the recruitment process, please let us know.