Head of Recruitment - AI Infrastructure Scale Up (Series D)

Compensation: up to $280k

Contract: FTE

Working style: onsite 5 days' a week

About the job

Hawkwood is partnering with a high-growth AI infrastructure company to recruit a Head of Recruiting.

Our client is building the infrastructure layer for the generative AI era, enabling developers and enterprises to create, deploy, and scale multimodal AI applications with unmatched speed, simplicity, and reliability. As a full-stack AI inference platform focused on image and video generation, they provide API-first access to both open-source and proprietary models, alongside direct GPU access for custom workloads. The business has scaled rapidly and has a highly diversified customer base and strong underlying unit economics.

Backed by leading investors including Sequoia and Nvidia, the company is operating at the centre of one of the fastest-growing segments in AI. With strong product-market fit and deep integration across the AI ecosystem, they are well positioned to become a foundational platform in the next wave of AI innovation.

With this momentum, hiring is a top strategic priority for the business. This is the first senior role in the recruiting function, offering a rare opportunity to define and scale talent from first principles. The Head of Recruiting will play a critical role in building and scaling a world-class team, shaping hiring strategy, and attracting exceptional technical talent in one of the most competitive areas of the market.

What you will be doing

• Own and scale the end-to-end recruiting function, building the foundations of a world-class talent organisation from first principles
• Partner closely with founders and senior leadership to define hiring priorities, success profiles, and org design across engineering, product, and go-to-market teams
• Lead full-cycle recruiting for highly technical roles, with a focus on AI/ML engineers, infrastructure talent, and product builders
• Design and implement scalable hiring processes, tools, and systems that can support rapid, high-quality growth
• Personally source and engage top-tier talent, leveraging deep networks across AI, developer, and startup ecosystems
• Build and nurture long-term pipelines of exceptional, often passive candidates in a highly competitive market
• Develop creative strategies to attract talent ahead of the market, including engaging with open-source communities, developer networks, and emerging talent hubs
• Deliver a high-touch, candidate-first experience that reflects the ambition and calibre of the company
• Own offer strategy and close senior and in-demand candidates, competing effectively against top-tier AI companies and hyperscalers
• Act as a strategic advisor to the business, bringing insight on talent markets, competitor hiring activity, and compensation trends

What we’re looking for

• Proven experience leading full-cycle recruiting in high-growth, high-bar technology environments
• Track record of hiring strong technical talent (e.g. engineering, infrastructure, or product), with a clear understanding of the market
• Experience building or scaling recruiting functions, ideally as an early or first talent hire
• Strong sourcing capability and an established network, with the ability to engage high-calibre, often passive candidates
• Demonstrated ability to partner closely with founders and senior stakeholders, shaping hiring strategy and influencing decisions
• High ownership and autonomy, comfortable operating as both a strategic leader and hands-on operator
• Experience designing and implementing scalable hiring processes, systems, and tooling
• Excellent communication and stakeholder management skills, with credibility across technical and non-technical teams
• High pace, urgency, and a bias to action, with the resilience to operate in an ambiguous, fast-moving environment

The offer

• Competitive compensation, including equity
• Health, dental, and vision insurance
• Regular team events and offsites
• Opportunity to work on challenging problems at the forefront of AI infrastructure
• Learning and growth opportunities as part of a high-calibre, fast-scaling team
• Primarily in-person culture in San Francisco, with flexibility for exceptional candidates

We recognize how challenging this current job market is for candidates, and Hawkwood are therefore striving to provide the best candidate experience we can.

If you are interested in this opportunity, we kindly request that you apply via this LinkedIn advert, as opposed to sending us an email or LinkedIn direct message. We are eager to ensure that each candidate application is considered fairly, and receives a consistent experience.

Unfortunately, we cannot ensure this standard if you enquire about a role via email or LinkedIn message, as it falls outside of our established process.