Manager, People Systems & Operations

About the Role

This role is the operational backbone of the People Team - owning the systems, workflows, governance, and standards that let Recruiting and People Operations execute efficiently, consistently, and at scale, from sourcing through offboarding.

This is a player-coach role. You'll personally own the operating model and systems roadmap, and lead a team of three - two People Operations Specialists and a Senior Systems/HRIS lead - who help build and run it.

This isn't a maintenance role. We need someone hungry to build something that doesn't fully exist yet, who takes ownership without waiting to be told, and who's comfortable holding people - including their own team - accountable.

What You'll Own

Area 1: Systems & Infrastructure
Own the systems architecture that powers the People function - the platforms, the data, and how they connect.

• Own the HRIS and ATS end-to-end: configuration, data integrity, permissions, and ongoing maintenance
• Own data standards and governance across the People systems stack, ensuring information is complete, accurate, and usable for reporting
• Establish operational KPIs, SLAs, and executive dashboards built on trustworthy, well-governed data
• Partner with our AI Optimization and API/engineering teams to scope and prioritize custom integrations and AI-enabled automation - you own what needs to be built and why; they own the technical build
• Serve as the first point of contact when systems or integrations break, coordinating with the technical teams on resolution and driving root-cause fixes rather than one-off patches

Area 2: Operations (Recruiting through People Operations)
Own the end-to-end operational infrastructure across the full employee lifecycle - from sourcing through offboarding - so Recruiting and People Operations function as one connected system rather than two handoffs.

• Design and document workflows spanning sourcing, hiring, preboarding, onboarding, and the full employee lifecycle
• Define and maintain operational policies, governance, and service-level expectations across both recruiting and people operations
• Own the handoff between Recruiting and People Operations, so there's no ambiguity or dropped data when a candidate becomes an employee
• Standardize documentation, approvals, and operational controls across the lifecycle
• Drive automation opportunities that reduce manual work and improve consistency, in partnership with technical teams where needed
• Continuously evaluate operations using data to identify bottlenecks and drive improvement

How You'll Work

You are the internal business operations leader embedded within the People organization.

Functional leaders define what great looks like.
You design - and lead the team that delivers - how great gets delivered consistently.

You partner with leaders across Recruiting, People Operations, HR Business Partners, Talent Development, AI Optimization, IT, Finance, and Legal to build an operating model that is scalable, measurable, and continuously improving.

Your work brings the same operational discipline expected from organizations like FP&A, Revenue Operations, and Product Operations by introducing:

• Service-level agreements (SLAs)
• Process governance
• Standard operating procedures
• Workflow architecture
• Systems governance and optimization
• Operational metrics
• Executive dashboards
• Data governance
• AI-enabled automation, in partnership with our AI Optimization and engineering teams
• Continuous improvement methodologies

Who You Are

• Hungry and ownership-driven - you want to build something that doesn't fully exist yet, not maintain what's already there
• Strong fluency with HR systems - HRIS, ATS, and how they connect to adjacent tools - even if you're not the one writing the integration code
• Experienced managing and developing a small team, ideally including technical or systems talent
• Comfortable holding people accountable and having hard conversations - with your own team and with functional stakeholders
• A background in People/HR Systems or Operations, or a BizOps/IT Operations background with genuine interest in making People systems and infrastructure the domain
• Bonus: experience partnering with engineering or data teams to scope and prioritize technical builds

Success Looks Like

After 12 months:

• The People systems stack (HRIS, ATS, and their connections) is well-governed, reliable, and documented, with clear ownership of every piece
• Recruiting and People Operations function as a single, connected operating model with seamless handoffs and no ambiguity in ownership
• The People Operations Specialists have successfully absorbed recruiting operations support and maintenance, with no drop in service levels
• Executive leaders have trusted dashboards built on complete, consistent, timely data
• Manual work has been meaningfully reduced through automation, delivered in partnership with technical teams
• Operational bottlenecks are proactively identified and resolved using data rather than anecdotes
• Your team operates with enough clarity and ownership that things keep moving smoothly

You are the Business Operations leader for the People Team - the person who owns the systems and operating model the business runs on, and leads the team that keeps it running. Your customers are the functional leaders across Recruiting and People. Your product is an operating system, delivered through infrastructure you govern and a team you lead.