Carmen Chan, who is about to become ZipRecruiter's chief financial officer, told CFO Dive that she has "worked deeply with the team" to prepare for her first time in the top finance role. Chan will officially assume the CFO position at the Santa Monica, California-based online job platform operator on August 17.

"Right now I'm in what I call the business learning journey phase," Chan said in an interview. That process includes "deep dives" with the heads of ZipRecruiter's most important product and revenue functions, as well as finance department leaders, to understand "the levers that can be pulled within each business segment, and where the biggest opportunities for continued transformation and innovation lie."

The final result after a long engagement

Chan said her joining the company, which operates an online job search marketplace, was the result of a "long engagement" process between the finance executive and the company. Her appointment comes months after then-CFO Timothy Yarbrough announced his departure. According to a filing submitted to the U.S. Securities and Exchange Commission on February 23, Yarbrough left for other opportunities. Chan will take over the CFO role from interim finance chief David Travers; Travers, a 10-year company veteran, has served as interim CFO since Yarbrough's departure.

According to the filing, in connection with her appointment, Chan will receive an annual base salary of $500,000 and will be eligible for an annual bonus based on performance metrics, with a minimum bonus of $100,000 in 2026. She is also eligible for a $200,000 signing bonus, payable in two installments 90 days and 180 days after her start date.

Chan said the company has been "very thoughtful" in her onboarding, giving her exposure to key matters and decisions before she officially assumes the CFO role, "so it doesn't feel like everything is being done for the first time or answering questions for the first time."

Before she formally accepted the ZipRecruiter CFO position, the way the company treated her involvement in key financial decisions such as capital allocation and capital structure was one of the signals that made her feel reassured. "I felt like I was being brought up to speed as a partner, so I'm not taking on things that I'm uncomfortable with or that I wouldn't want to continue or carry forward as CFO," she said.

Close collaboration with Travers

In addition, Chan participated in ZipRecruiter's latest earnings call held on August 5, joining the finance team as it wrapped up its most recent earnings cycle. For the quarter ended June 30, the company reported net income of just over $43 million, compared with a net loss of $9.5 million in the same period last year and a net loss of $4.7 million in the first quarter of 2026, according to its shareholder letter.

In the weeks before officially assuming the role, Chan also spent significant time working with Travers. Travers has served as the company's president since December 2021, after previously serving as treasurer for six years; according to a press release, Travers will continue in his president role after Chan takes over as CFO. Chan described Travers as "a key stakeholder with a wealth of wisdom to share," and the two "have been highly aligned throughout the transition process, and even in bringing me in."

Focus on value creation

Chan joins ZipRecruiter at a time when the company is working to keep pace with the changing job market. For example, the introduction of artificial intelligence is far more complex than technology simply replacing existing jobs, and the labor market remains relatively stable. In this environment, companies like ZipRecruiter are thinking carefully about how job platforms themselves should evolve.

Chan said she is very focused on ZipRecruiter's investor relations and capital allocation strategy as the company seeks to create value in a rapidly changing employment landscape. "When we think about the existing capital base and the portfolio of growth opportunities, what should be prioritized?" she asked. "How do we think about return on investment within that framework, and how do we prudently and efficiently allocate capital and people to various priorities?"

Chan is drawing on her deep capital markets background to help ZipRecruiter "re-articulate its equity story to investors, with the aim of attracting a deeper and broader investor base as we continue to transform the ZipRecruiter product," she said in an interview with CFO Dive.

Before accepting the ZipRecruiter position, Chan served as a managing director in the internet coverage area of Barclays' technology investment banking division, according to her LinkedIn profile. She also previously worked at UBS and Goldman Sachs, and held roles as vice president of corporate development and investor relations at health services company Noom Inc., and head of revenue and partnerships at internet publisher theSkimm.

These experiences have given her strong pattern recognition, especially in consumer technology, "to discern what is good versus average in how businesses scale and operate," she said. "I know what it means to drive strategic thinking and build accountability within an organization." She told CFO Dive: "A large part of my career has been advising founders and management teams on financing and strategic transactions. At its core, it's about translating the internal story of a company into language investors truly understand—that is, how this business works."