About the Role

A fast-growing, seed-stage AI company in Munich is hiring a Founding People & Talent Lead to build the Talent and People function from scratch. This is a high-impact, hands-on founding role working directly alongside the founding team to solve the single most critical scaling challenge for a high-growth AI business operating in a large, underserved market.

The company automates inside sales processes — quoting, order handling, and customer inquiries — for distributors and manufacturers using enterprise-grade AI. With strong early traction across the DACH region and backing from top-tier investors, the team is now ready to scale headcount rapidly and needs a sharp, high-agency operator to own that journey end-to-end.

Early emphasis will be heavily on Talent Acquisition, with increasing scope into broader People operations as the company grows.

What You'll Do

• Build and own the full hiring engine — leading recruiting end-to-end from role definition through to offer and close.
• Source and close exceptional candidates across functions, spending the majority of your time on talent early on.
• Design and scale recruiting processes, analytics, workflows, and operating rhythms that enable fast, high-quality hiring.
• Partner with founders and team leads to define role expectations, calibrate hiring decisions, and challenge org design.
• Shape People systems over time, including onboarding, performance calibration, career progression frameworks, and compensation benchmarking.
• Develop and execute an employer brand strategy to attract top talent across the DACH region and beyond.
• Build and nurture a talent network across universities, startups, and technical communities.
• Leverage AI tools and experiment continuously with new recruiting workflows to increase hiring velocity and quality.
• Champion a high hiring bar and implement scalable measures to maintain standards as the company grows.
• Contribute actively to company culture and hire with a long-term retention and development lens.

What We're Looking For

Must-have:

• 2–5 years of experience with meaningful time in Talent Acquisition, People, or org development at a high-growth startup or scaleup.
• Demonstrated experience leading end-to-end recruiting across all functions (role definition, sourcing, assessment, closing) — ideally in a hypergrowth context (e.g. 10→50 or 30→100 employees).
• Structured thinker who can design systems and execute them independently (design, implement, iterate).
• Strong storytelling and relationship-building skills with a track record of sourcing and closing senior candidates.
• Daily user of AI tools with a genuine curiosity to experiment with new workflows.
• Ability to build employer branding and a talent network to attract top candidates in the DACH region and beyond.
• Full professional fluency in English.
• Comfortable with on-site work in Munich and a high-agency, ambiguous environment.

Nice-to-have:

• German language skills (a meaningful plus for DACH hiring and employer branding).
• Experience with performance calibration and compensation benchmarking as part of scaling People operations.
• Background or strong interest in B2B SaaS or AI/enterprise software environments.
• Openness to growing into a broader People leadership role as the company scales.

Location & Work Arrangement

This role is based on-site in Munich, Germany. The team works together in person and this role is expected to be present in the office. Visa sponsorship is not available for this position.

Compensation & Benefits

Compensation details were not specified for this role. You will work as a core founding team member at a well-funded, early-stage company with significant scope for ownership, career growth, and impact.