Founding Recruiter

Remote (United States)

Work Arrangement

Must align with Eastern Time working hours

Employment Type

Status: Full-time

Compensation

Annual Base Salary: $100,000–$160,000 per year
Equity: Competitive equity package included

About the Role

This opportunity is for a Founding Recruiter to build and lead talent acquisition at a venture-backed, early-stage startup. As one of the first hires, you will work directly with the founding team to design recruiting strategy, scale the organization, and establish strong hiring processes from the ground up.

The company is experiencing rapid growth and needs a recruiting leader who can proactively source top-tier product and technical talent while implementing AI-driven tools to streamline and enhance hiring workflows.

What You’ll Do

• Own the full-cycle recruiting process from sourcing and screening to interviews, offers, and closing candidates.
• Partner directly with founders to define hiring priorities and scale the team from early-stage to growth phase.
• Proactively source passive product and technical candidates using networking, LinkedIn, and innovative outreach strategies.
• Build and maintain structured talent pipelines to support rapid scaling.
• Integrate AI-driven tools to improve sourcing efficiency, candidate matching, and process automation.
• Develop recruiting processes, documentation, and systems suitable for a fast-growing startup environment.
• Support early people operations tasks, including contractor coordination and onboarding setup.

Qualifications

• 4+ years of full-cycle recruiting experience in early-stage or high-growth tech environments.
• Proven success recruiting product and technical roles.
• Experience scaling teams in fast-paced startup environments.
• Strong sourcing and headhunting skills with a track record of closing passive candidates.
• Comfortable working directly with founders and navigating ambiguity.
• Familiarity with AI-enabled tools and modern recruiting technology.
• Excellent communication, relationship-building, and organizational skills.
• Bachelor’s degree preferred.

Preferred Experience

• Background in early-stage startups (Seed to Series C).
• Experience in AI, GovTech, B2B SaaS, or related technology sectors.
• Experience building recruiting processes from scratch.

Why This Role Stands Out

• Direct collaboration with founders in a high-impact role.
• Opportunity to design and own the recruiting function from day one.
• Remote-first flexibility with meaningful equity participation.
• Chance to shape company culture during a critical growth phase.