The problem
Small business owners lose hours and risk penalties running payroll, taxes, benefits and state compliance themselves
What they do
Payroll, benefits, HR, 401(k) and compliance platform for small businesses and their accountants
Traction $1B+ trailing revenue (Feb 2026), ~30% growth, 500K+ customers, cash-flow positive, ARR accelerating 5 quarters
Hiring trend
- Open roles
- 101
- Ops roles
- 4
- Headcount
- ~4,000
Headcount +3% YoY (~3,960, Mar 2026, Revelio); job postings +24% vs 2025; 99 open roles
Hiring in
- Denver
- San Francisco
- New York
- Remote
Latest news
Oct 2026
Rebuilt Gusto Pro with AI payroll workflows and multi-client MCP for 23,000+ accounting firms ↗Glassdoor
3.0 ★ 1,159 reviews ↗Funding
- Last round
- $175M Series E (later liquidity: $200M+ tender Jun 2025; debt)
- Stage
- Late-stage private (Series E)
- Date
- Aug 2021
Led by T. Rowe Price (Series E); Ontario Teachers' (Jun 2025 tender, not primary)
- Hiring+2101 open roles on the live job board (30+ roles = +2)
- Funding recency0Latest money ($175M Series E (later liquidity: $200M+ tender Jun 2025; debt), Aug 2021) isn't a new primary round, so it doesn't count
- Traction+1.5Strong growth: $1B+ trailing revenue (Feb 2026), ~30% growth, 500K+ customers, cash-flow positive, ARR accelerating 5 quarters
- Red flags0Watch-outs noted below, none scored as a significant flag
- Total3.52 + 0 + 1.5 − 0 = 3.5 → Tempo (3.5–4.24)
Distance (Marathon) is a separate read on how long the lead can last. It doesn't change the score.
Distance
Marathon · edge: hard to leave
$1B+ revenue, 500K+ small business customers, ~30% growth and cash-flow positive.
Sources: Gusto: $1B trailing revenue (PR Newswire, May 2026) ↗ · Gusto Pro and accountant partner program (PR Newswire, Oct 2026) ↗
Watch-outs
Soft, not scored: Glassdoor 3.0 and down ~6% in 12 mo; recent reviews cite team-level layoffs (Aug 2025) and leadership churn; no confirmed company-wide RIF since Feb 2023 (126 roles)
Sources: Glassdoor reviews mentioning layoffs ↗ · Glassdoor review, Aug 2025: recent layoffs in Salesforce support teams ↗ · Glassdoor review page, Sep 2026: rating down 6% over 12 months ↗ · Layoffs.fyi: last tracked Gusto layoff (126 roles, 2023) ↗
Last checked Oct 25, 2026