Sr. Manager/Director of Talent Acquisition

Company Overview

Our client is focused on solving one of the most important challenges in AI: helping organizations trust, explain, and defend the decisions made by AI systems. Their technology is designed for environments where AI cannot be a black box and where accuracy, transparency, data integrity, and compliance are critical.

The company’s AI platform supports secure deployment across cloud, on-premise, and edge environments. Their work helps organizations reduce bias, strengthen data integrity, simplify model oversight, and deploy AI responsibly in high-stakes settings.

This is a mission-driven, high-growth technology company backed by strong investors and already trusted by leading enterprise and government customers. The team is made up of strategic thinkers, builders, and problem-solvers working on complex AI challenges that impact some of society’s most important systems.

About the Position

The Sr. Manager/Director of Talent Acquisition & Employer Brand will build the company’s first formal in-house talent acquisition function from the ground up. This person will own the full recruiting strategy, operating model, systems, processes, reporting, team buildout, and candidate experience during a period of rapid expansion.

This role sits at the center of the company’s next stage of growth. The right person will be both strategic and hands-on, with the ability to create scalable infrastructure while also staying close to hiring execution, recruiter development, hiring manager partnership, and candidate experience.

The company is looking for a leader who thrives at the intersection of data, analytics, systems, and human-centered hiring. This person should be energized by building from scratch, creating structure in ambiguity, and designing a recruiting function that can scale thoughtfully across highly specialized and competitive talent markets.

Responsibilities

• Build and launch the company’s end-to-end talent acquisition function, including recruiting strategy, operating model, workflows, systems, and scalable infrastructure.
• Design, document, and continuously improve recruiting SOPs across sourcing, interviewing, offers, closing, candidate experience, and hiring manager partnership.
• Create consistent and polished recruiting assets, including outreach templates, interview guides, playbooks, hiring manager communications, and candidate-facing materials.
• Partner with People Operations, IT, Finance, and leadership to integrate recruiting tools and build automation across background checks, offer approvals, offer letters, and hiring workflows.
• Hire, lead, and develop a high-impact recruiting team capable of attracting specialized AI, technical, product, corporate, and go-to-market talent.
• Set a high bar for recruiter capability, credibility, market insight, candidate experience, and partnership with hiring leaders.
• Build recruiting dashboards and scorecards to track time to fill, quality of hire, pipeline health, source of hire, diversity metrics, and overall hiring performance.
• Use data and analytics to forecast hiring demand, identify risks and bottlenecks, and help leadership make smarter hiring decisions.
• Partner with leaders to define role scorecards, success profiles, and hiring plans that align with business outcomes.
• Design and implement structured interview frameworks, including role-based interviews, culture interviews, and assessment tools where applicable.
• Train hiring managers and interview teams on interview best practices, candidate evaluation, equitable decision-making, and consistent feedback.
• Shape and strengthen the company’s employer brand in partnership with People, Marketing, and Leadership.
• Ensure every candidate interaction reflects the company’s values around transparency, respect, and trust.
• Use candidate feedback, surveys, and process data to continuously improve the candidate experience.
• Ensure U.S. hiring practices are EEOC compliant and that recruiting processes are built to support GDPR requirements for European hiring.
• Build scalable and compliant hiring practices that support continued growth across North America and Europe.

Requirements

• 6–8 years of progressive talent acquisition experience, including experience building or scaling recruiting teams.
• 3 years of experience leading talent acquisition teams.
• Proven success designing recruiting operations, systems, processes, and analytics from the ground up.
• Experience working in an early-stage, high-growth, or rapidly scaling startup environment.
• Strong business and data acumen, with comfort using dashboards, metrics, and insights to drive recruiting decisions.
• Experience hiring across highly specialized, technical, product, corporate, or emerging talent markets.
• Ability to build scalable recruiting infrastructure while remaining hands-on and close to execution.
• Strong understanding of structured interviewing, hiring manager enablement, recruiting operations, and candidate experience.
• Experience shaping or supporting employer brand initiatives in partnership with People, Marketing, or executive leadership.
• A human-centered, inclusive approach to hiring, with a strong focus on fairness, consistency, and candidate experience.
• Experience supporting multi-region hiring across North America and Europe is preferred.
• Working knowledge of EEOC compliance and GDPR requirements is preferred.
• Prior experience with Greenhouse is a plus, but not required.
• Strong executive presence and the ability to partner closely with senior leaders in a fast-moving environment.
• A strategic builder mindset with the ability to operate in ambiguity, create structure, and scale with the business.

Additional Info:

• Hybrid schedule based out of Austin, TX office.
• Competitive benefits package, including medical, dental, vision, life insurance, 401(k) with company match, paid parental leave, unlimited PTO, and paid company holidays.

Why This Opportunity

This is a rare opportunity to build a talent acquisition function from the ground up at a high-growth AI company solving complex, mission-critical problems. The right person will have the opportunity to shape how the company hires, scales, tells its story to the market, and builds the recruiting infrastructure needed for its next stage of growth.