Amid the chaotic turn of events for Facebook globally as well as in India, its popular messaging company WhatsApp is hoping to shed off the bad press in the country. WhatsApp has over 200 million monthly active users in India and to manage and grow this user base, the company is now looking for a country head. Facebook has posted a full-time job role on its Careers page where it is searching for a candidate who can lead the WhatsApp business in India, especially the P2P payments service that recently began under testing phase.
The WhatsApp Head of India position has been vacant for a long time and apparently needs a candidate as soon as possible to monitor the payments service in India. WhatsApp payments service was introduced in February for select users in India under the beta programme. Also, this would come close to the heels of the WhatsApp Business app that was launched earlier this year.
The position is for the Mumbai office of Facebook where the operations for WhatsApp are also carried out. The country head will report to WhatsApp’s Chief Operating Officer Matthew Idema in California. The responsibilities of the country head include:
- Deeply understand and regularly influence product direction and specific product decisions
- Represent WhatsApp’s product strategy in the country and drive alignment with partners and stakeholders
- Lead partnership efforts in the market, acting as a cross-functional leader across WhatsApp and Facebook teams.
- Build relationships with key partner, and other constituents at senior levels
- Represent WhatsApp generally in the country as needed
Additionally, the WhatsApp India country head needs to fulfil certain criteria to be eligible for the position. He should be an ardent WhatsApp user, besides having over 15 years of experience in ‘product-driven’ companies. He should also have over 5 years of experience working with payment technologies in India. The minimum academic qualification that the candidate should hold is a degree in Bachelor of Science or Master of Science majoring in Engineering, Science, or Business.
