Director of People

Overview

You’re an exceptional People Leader who has experience building out the People function of a hyper growth scale up. You have led a People team of ~15 or more and are excited to join an earlier stage company where you’ll build back up to that team size, and more, over time. Initially you will lead an organisation of ~6. This role gets you behind the curtain of HR technology, enabling you to geek out at the intersection of People technology, process and data. You care so deeply about excellence with the People function that it makes you outspoken with your well founded perspectives compared to the majority of HR professionals and you would relish constantly experimenting with better ways to do Human Resources.
About the Role

Hi Jim, the VP of People and Talent at Ashby. I’ve been lucky enough to have been in roles that change the landscape of the TA technology, been exposed to massive hiring data sets and been tasked with reimagining TA processes across a wide range of company stages. I joined Ashby to continue this work and to be a disruptor in how companies hire and support great people because I truly believe that People teams can do a better job of serving our applicant pools and employees. Reimagining typical HR practices will be a key element to this role. I’m looking for a thought leader on the HR side of our People function. This role will set the foundation for how we scale Ashby as a company. You will review all our existing People practices and drive the change for what we need now and into the future. That includes polish to process change, HR systems selection and implementation, data analytics, and of course documentation. You are an expert at communicating; able to influence scaled change across the company without thrash. This role will evolve based on the growth of Ashby, so comfort with ambiguity is important. This is not your run-of-the-mill People Operations or HR Leader role; in addition to your core internal responsibilities, you’ll become an expert on our world class people technology suite, to become an external thought leader. You will be called upon to speak with customers and Product Managers, to talk at conferences and to write compelling content for an audience of People professionals and Hiring Managers.
Why you should or shouldn’t apply:

Leading a People team can be extremely different by company. This section should help you decide if this role is for you.
You’ve built and led a people team to support a SaaS company that is scaling from ~500 to over 1000 employees

You are intrigued by where else in the People tech stack we might take the company. We are at a moment in time where technology is impacting people in every aspect of work. You’re excited to be at the centre of that.

You build exceptional process, people and environments

You have excellent communication skills – we value clear and concise communication

You understand myriad stakeholders and their motivations (what matters to a Head of Department may be distinct from what matters to an individual contributor; you can help each achieve their goals)

You’re willing to craft solutions for both the tactical (e.g. help solve an onboarding issue) to the strategic (e.g. scaling from 500-1000 employees)

You have high standards and are comfortable holding others accountable by setting clear expectations, especially relevant to secure alignment across stakeholders

You have a high level of empathy for our employees – their pain is our pain

You are comfortable and capable playing HRBP where necessary and you also have deep experience or specialisation in a typical people function (e.g. Total Rewards)

You are excited to shape our People team and by this point in this JD your brain already has a vision of what you’ll do

You might not be a great fit if:

You haven’t led an experienced team of 10+ before

You prefer defined structure and are not excited by ambiguity or amorphous opportunities

You prefer to spend your time focused on one or two priorities and are not comfortable context switching across several focus areas

You want to impose HR on the employee base rather than building an environment where HR is there when needed.

You are uneasy holding colleagues accountable or otherwise serving as arbitrator when competing opinions are presented

You have difficulty setting boundaries and tend to default to a ‘yes’ stance

You are not interested in a role where you take on less interesting or visible work alongside the really fun stuff

You don’t believe in the opportunity and challenges set by a remote & asynchronous workforce.

You’ll work on:

Team Leadership:

Leading our People function comprising of an HRPB team, HR Generalist team and our team of People Specialists

Documentation:

Creating and improving all of our people focused documentation

Process and functional Improvement:

“Implement Continuous improvement” is one of our Operating Principles. “We hold ourselves to a very high standard, which is: there’s always a better way!”. Don’t think of this as small iterations over time, for example, we’re currently overhauling Total Rewards and restructuring the employment for cohorts of our overseas employees by setting up local entities in key regions.

Performance Management:

Create and operationalize performance processes and develop frameworks for evaluating and growing talent.

New Initiatives:

As we scale we will need a wider variety of people services, practices and processes.

Events:

Your team is responsible for the annual company offsite (previously held in Cancun), departmental offsites (GTM Kick Offs, Engineering/Product/Design offsites) and team offsites.

Ashby Product:

Partnering closely with the Product Team to distill your observations into tangible feedback. To help scale your efforts, we will aim to resolve pain points and increase your influence with documentation; you’ll be able to contribute on both of these fronts as the Voice of the Customer with a pedagogical slant. You’ll be involved in early deployment and testing of features whilst ensuring all new functionality is effectively utilized internally after release

Compliance:

Ensure HR policies and practices comply with all applicable laws in regions where Ashby has employees. Maintain accurate employee records and documentation. Support audits and reporting requirements, and help develop training and communication to keep the organization aligned with legal and regulatory standards.

Operational Efficiency:

Automation, AI deployment and efficient processes are critical to how we will scale Ashby. Your role will be to help ensure maximum impact of potential efficiency gains

Interview Process

Hiring Manager interview with Jim - 60 minutes

Meet a Founder - 30 minutes with Benji

Take Home Challenge and presentation with Jim and Benji

Final Panel:
Partnering with an Org Leader Interview with Mike - 30 minutes

Finance and Data Interview with Shane and Kevin - 30 minutes

People/HR Interview - with Hannah 30 minutes

Leadership Interview with Kelsey or Abhik - 30 minutes

Your Recruiter will be me! I will be your main point of contact and I’ll help prepare you for interviews.
About Ashby

We’re building the next generation of recruiting software and we’re starting with a suite of products that helps talent leaders, recruiters, and hiring managers run an efficient and data-driven hiring process.
Our product and growth are exceptional. Ashby All-in-One is powerful, easy to use, and replaces several venture-backed companies worth of products (often with a better experience). We have notable customers like Notion, Linear, Shopify, and Snowflake. Our growth and retention metrics are best-in-class among our peers: we have tens of millions in ARR, growing >100% year over year, very low churn, and many years of runway.
We are well funded and backed by great investors, including Y Combinator, Elad Gil and Lachy Groom. We have over 4,000 amazing customers - yet weve only taken the first steps toward a much larger opportunity. In short, its the perfect time to join!
Ashby’s success hinges on hiring great people and creating an environment where we can be happy, feel challenged, and do our best work. We’re being deliberate about building that environment from the ground up. I hope that excites you enough to apply.
We\re in the talent acquisition software business. We run the end-to-end hiring process through our own platform, and ensure a level playing field for all candidates. Please focus your energy on the quality of your application.
EEO statement: Ashby provides equal employment opportunities (EEO) to all employees and applicants for employment without regard to race, color, religion, sex, national origin, age, disability, genetics, sexual orientation, gender identity, or gender expression. We are committed to a diverse and inclusive workforce and welcome people from all backgrounds, experiences, perspectives, and abilities.

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