Does this offer sound like a managers responsibilities with a standard pay ?

I spoke with the CEO of a company I’m really excited about last week. We have another call tomorrow where he’ll introduce me to his second-in-command and (apparently) send over an official offer.

After our first conversation, where we discussed expectations, goals, and responsibilities, I’ve started to realise the role sounds a lot like a managerial position. My concern is that I might be offered a standard employee salary but expected to take on manager level responsibility.

The department I’d be joining is currently pretty barebones. There’s a 65-year-old working part-time with no real experience in the role, and recently they hired a new graduate who also has no experience. From what I understand, I’d basically be starting from scratch, figuring out what equipment and tools are needed, setting up workflows, creating protocols, etc.

On top of that, no one else in the company (including the CEO) really understands this department since it’s quite specialised. That means most decisions will rely on me, and I’d effectively be running the department solo. I was also told the other two employees would be “helping me out” by handling tasks I don’t want to do, but they’d need training from me.

To me, this sounds like I’d be responsible for building and running the entire department, and if anything goes wrong, it would fall on me. However, there’s been no mention of a manager title or anything like that.

So… how do I bring this up with the CEO without coming across the wrong way?