US Sales Development Team Lead - Agentic AI

Job description

ABOUT US Humaans is building the next generation of infrastructure for the workplace; software designed for companies that are scaling fast, operating globally, and pushing into new boundaries. What started as a system of record has evolved into a broader platform for operating people globally. With Athena, our agentic AI layer, Humaans moves beyond data management into intelligent orchestration, connecting workflows across HR, IT, Finance, and Operations so organisations can act faster and with greater confidence, redefining how work gets done. We work with ambitious teams across Europe and the US, from AI-native companies like Lovable, Poolside, Fyxer AI, and Tandem Health, to established, high-growth organisations scaling internationally and through acquisition, including Quantexa, Sellpy, Manychat, Gigs, Croud, and Threecolts. These teams don’t buy software for features,they buy leverage. The ability to run faster, cleaner, and with more control as complexity compounds. To date, we’ve raised $20m in venture funding from some of the most respected founders, operators, and funds in technology: Lachy Groom (Physical Intelligence), Stewart Butterfield (Slack), Tobias Lütke (Shopify), Dylan Field (Figma), Jeff Weiner (LinkedIn), Claire Johnson (Stripe), Oliver Jay (OpenAI), Jay Simmons (Bond) as well as Y Combinator, Moonfire, Frontline Ventures, Pathlight Ventures, and Exor. If you have massive ambition and want to work on a hard problem, with a small team that moves fast, at a moment when the category is genuinely up for grabs - this is it. THE ROLE We’re looking for a Founding Sales Development Team Lead to build and run the outbound engine for Athena, our agentic AI product, in the US. You’ll be responsible for building a group of ambitious sales associates into a precision pipeline machine, setting the standard, writing the playbook and coaching the team to consistently create the opportunities that fuel our largest US deals. This is a player-coach role. You’ll carry your own outbound, make calls and open target accounts yourself, then turn what works into a repeatable playbook for the team. You’ll stay close to the work through call reviews, sequence development and live coaching, while holding a high bar for quality and creating the conditions for people to develop quickly. AI is central to how we expect the team to operate. Better research, sharper sequences, smarter prioritisation and faster learning should give us an advantage. You’ll need to know how to use AI effectively yourself and how to embed it into the way your team works every day. You won’t be inheriting an established US motion. You’ll work closely with our Founding US GTM Lead to build it from the ground up, defining what great outbound looks like for Athena in a greenfield market and creating foundations that can scale with the business. WHAT YOU’LL DO - Own Athena’s US outbound function end to end, including team performance, pipeline contribution, process and development - Build pipeline yourself through cold calling, thoughtful outbound and creative approaches to opening our highest-value target accounts - Develop our US outbound strategy from a blank page, refining segmentation, targeting, messaging and the playbook as we learn - Turn what works in your own prospecting into repeatable approaches that the wider team can learn from and execute - Use AI-assisted tooling to improve account research, personalisation, sequencing, prioritisation and follow-ups - Coach and develop the team through structured 1:1s, call reviews, live deal support and regular feedback - Set a high bar for cold calling and coach the team on how to earn attention and create meaningful conversations - Build a culture of accountability, experimentation, continuous improvement and high performance - Partner closely with our Founding US GTM Lead and Revenue Operations to maintain strong pipeline quality, healthy conversion rates and a seamless handoff - Use data and AI-powered analytics to understand performance, surface patterns and act quickly when something isn’t working - Experiment with unconventional prospecting approaches and turn successful ideas into repeatable plays - Bring what you learn from the US market back to Product and Engineering as Athena’s category and product continue to take shape WHAT WE’RE LOOKING FOR - 5+ years of experience in outbound sales, including at least 2 years managing or leading a BDR team within B2B SaaS - A consistent track record of building pipeline and coaching others to do the same. You know what good outbound looks like and can teach it - Strong cold calling experience and the ability to coach others on how to confidently and effectively open conversations - A builder’s mindset. You’re creative about opening doors, persistent through rejection and comfortable developing the approach while executing it - Experience building pipeline for an early-stage or category-creating product where customers don’t already understand what they need or why - Deep familiarity with modern outbound tooling, ideally including tools such as Clay, Claude Code, Lemlist, LinkedIn Sales Navigator and Prospeo - Hands-on experience using AI to improve an outbound workflow, with a clear understanding of what changed in quality, speed or conversion as a result - Strong analytical instincts and the ability to use data to diagnose underperformance, identify patterns and improve the motion - A coaching-first approach to leadership. You measure your success by what the team produces and how quickly people develop - Comfort operating with ambiguity, creating clarity as you go and moving quickly without waiting for perfect enablement or information - Experience working in a high-growth, VC-backed environment where priorities move quickly and the playbook is still being written - A clear, direct communication style and the ability to influence effectively across the organisation YOU MAY NOT BE A GREAT FIT IF - You want to manage outbound from a distance. This is a player-coach role, and you’ll be expected to prospect, cold call and open accounts alongside the team - You need an established playbook, mature US motion or clear set of instructions before you can perform - You prefer optimising an existing outbound engine rather than building one from the ground up - You rely on brand recognition or existing category demand to create pipeline. Athena is entering a greenfield US market, so creating conviction is part of the job - You measure success primarily through activity volume rather than pipeline quality, conversion and revenue impact - You prefer giving people targets and leaving them to execute rather than actively coaching, reviewing and developing their skills - You see AI as an optional productivity tool rather than something that should fundamentally improve how a modern outbound team operates - You’re uncomfortable experimenting with new prospecting approaches, learning from rejection and changing course quickly when something isn’t working This is an in-person role. Our team comes together in the office Monday through Thursday, while most of the team collaborates in person on Mondays, Tuesdays, and Thursdays. PACKAGE & BENEFITS Early stage startups can be messy – we know that. We're putting effort in providing you with the best employee experience and a quality driven environment in exchange for trusting us. - Market-leading compensation that reflects your value - 25 days paid time off each year plus public holidays - Share Options with 5-year exercise window so you don’t feel pressure to exercise if you leave - Quarterly team events, and company offsites - Top tier private coverage for health, vision and dental care - A new MacBook and tools you need to do your best work - Enhanced parental leave with up to 16 weeks for primary and 4 weeks for secondary - Learning & development budget WHY JOIN HUMAANS TODAY? HR tech is having its AI moment and we’re positioned to own it. Humaans started as a next-gen HRIS taking on large incumbents in a massive market. We’ve since evolved into something even bigger: an AI platform that sits across workforce data and automates the operational layer of HR entirely; the natural progression of what we’ve been building toward. The product is highly differentiated. It’s built around a structured workforce data model that makes AI reliable in an HR context, something no one else has gotten right. Customers notice the difference immediately. We’re backed by Y Combinator, Lachy Groom, Moonfire, Frontline Ventures, and operators who’ve built some of the most consequential software companies of the last decade: the founders of Slack, Figma, and Shopify, and Asana’s former CRO and Head of OpenAI International. We’re a small team with an unapologetically high bar. It shows up in the product, in how we communicate, and in the standards we hold each other to. OUR COMMITMENT TO DIVERSITY At Humaans we’re looking for genuinely good people that are transparent and emphatic. We’re committed to providing equal opportunities, a diverse and inclusive work environment, and ensuring a fair interview process for everyone. You’re welcome to apply no matter your gender, ethnicity, sexual orientation, religion, civil or family status, age, disability, or race. PRIVACY NOTICE We care about your privacy. When you apply for a role at Humaans, we’ll collect and process your personal data as part of our recruitment process. This includes things like your CV, contact details, and any other information you choose to share. We may also contact you about future opportunities. You can ask us to delete your data at any time. For more details, see our Privacy Policy https://humaans.io/privacy#h.k3wp7f8qzl9x.