Sr. Talent Acquisition Partner

Summary
Location: Irvine, CA (onsite)

About Kardion
Kardion is a cardiovascular medical device company developing next-generation mechanical circulatory support technology, with dual headquarters in Irvine, California and Stuttgart, Germany. Every moment matters. Our team is building toward a future where circulatory support gives patients and clinicians more time, more options, and more certainty.
Summary
As our Senior, Talent Acquisition Partner, you will own how we find, assess, and hire that team. You will run full-cycle recruiting for engineering, quality, regulatory, clinical, supply chain, IT, finance, and G&A roles, as US headcount grows several times over by commercialization.

Essential Responsibilities

• Partner with hiring teams and run structured intake meetings that define the success profile, must-have skills, interview panel, scorecard, and target start date for every role.
• Own full-cycle recruiting: sourcing, screening, interviews, debriefs, references, offers, and closing.
• Build multi-channel pipelines for hard-to-find medical device talent (catheter and delivery systems, mechanical circulatory support, design and manufacturing quality, regulatory, and clinical) through direct outreach, referrals, LinkedIn Recruiter, and industry networks.
• Manage recruiting agencies only for approved searches, hold them to agreed terms, and reduce agency spend over time.
• Coordinate interviews across US and German teams and time zones, including onsite visits and finalist presentations.
• Prepare offers with HR Leadership using market data and internal equity, and hand off smoothly to onboarding.
• Own the ATS: keep records clean and reportable for audits, and track time-to-fill, pipeline health, source of hire, offer acceptance, and agency spend.
• Deliver a professional, inclusive candidate experience that shows candidates the mission and pace of an early-stage medical device company.
• Keep hiring compliant with US and California laws.
• Other duties and projects as assigned.

What Success Looks Like in Year One

• Priority roles filled on the timelines that support our milestones.
• A repeatable hiring process in place: intake, structured interviews, scorecards, and debriefs for every role.
• Agency spend meaningfully reduced.
• Monthly recruiting dashboard build out to leadership team

Skills, Qualifications & Key Knowledge Areas

• Bachelor's degree in Human Resources, Business, Communications, Psychology, or a related field, or equivalent experience.
• 6+ years of full-cycle talent acquisition, including 3+ years in medical device; cardiovascular or Class III device experience strongly preferred.
• Proven success filling technical and regulated roles such as R&D engineering, quality, regulatory, and clinical, plus director and VP-level searches.
• Startup or high-growth experience: comfortable building process while carrying a full requisition load.
• Active medical device network in Southern California.
• Skilled with ATS platforms (JazzHR or similar) and LinkedIn Recruiter; uses data to drive decisions.
• Strong interviewing, assessment, and influencing skills with executives and hiring managers.
• Sound judgment and discretion with confidential information.
• Working knowledge of California employment law as it applies to hiring.

Environment

• Office: Irvine, CA, onsite
• Travel: minimal; occasional industry events and university outreach.

Additional Information

Physical abilities: While performing the duties of this job, the employee is regularly required to sit, stand, walk, talk, and hear for up to 8 hours per day. The employee regularly lifts and carries up to 10 pounds and occasionally up to 20 pounds. Duties involve daily keyboard and computer use and require close vision. These demands are representative of those needed to perform the essential functions of the job. Reasonable accommodations may be made to enable individuals with disabilities to perform the essential functions.

Language abilities: Excellent verbal and written communication skills in English, with the ability to communicate clearly and professionally with colleagues in the US and Germany.

Compensation and benefits: The base salary range for this role is $125,000-$145,000. Final pay depends on job-related skills, experience, and location. This role may be eligible for equity and an annual incentive bonus, plus Kardion's benefits package.

Equal opportunity: Kardion is an equal opportunity employer. We consider all qualified applicants without regard to race, color, religion, sex, sexual orientation, gender identity, national origin, age, disability, veteran status, or any other characteristic protected by law. Kardion will consider qualified applicants with arrest and conviction records in accordance with the California Fair Chance Act.