Director of People Operations - AI x FinTech, Scale-up

Director of People Operations

Location: London, Hybrid

Salary: £150,000 - £180,000 + Equity

About the company:

Hawkwood is partnering with one of Europe’s fastest-growing FinTech AI scale-ups, which has just achieved unicorn status following a $170m Series C funding round, valuing the business at $1.3bn. The company has scaled from 60 employees in 2021 to more than 400 globally today, with continued international expansion across EMEA, APAC and the Americas.

This is a business that has achieved exceptional and sustained growth, doubling revenue year-on-year for the past five years while rapidly expanding its global team across London, New York and Belfast to meet growing customer demand. Over the last 12 months alone, headcount has grown from 200 to 400 employees as the business continues to invest heavily in product innovation, international expansion and customer success.

With a customer base that includes many of the world’s leading financial organisations, and a track record of strong performance in both challenging and ultra-competitive market conditions, the business has proven both its market relevance and long-term resilience.

The opportunity:

This hire comes at a pivotal moment for the business and its People function. Following a period of rapid scale, the organisation is making significant investment into its People Operations capability, creating the infrastructure required to support a truly global company operating at scale.

The Director of People Operations will take ownership of building and professionalising the global People Ops function from the ground up. The role requires someone who enjoys bringing structure to complexity and building scalable, people-first operations within high-growth businesses.

The remit is broad and high impact: from building a global People Ops team and fixing fragmented systems and data, through to establishing compliance across multiple international locations, building compensation and mobility frameworks, and creating a best-in-class employee experience. This role will play a critical part in enabling the next stage of global growth.

What you’ll do:

• Build and lead the global People Operations function through its next phase of scale
• Partner closely with founders and senior leadership on organisational effectiveness and scale readiness
• Hire and develop key capability across People Ops, analytics, rewards and employee experience
• Establish scalable, globally consistent people processes across the UK, US, APAC and LATAM
• Overhaul and optimise current people systems, data integrity and reporting capabilities
• Design compensation, rewards and mobility frameworks to support international growth
• Create a high-quality employee experience with a strong operational and UX mindset
• Bring greater rigour, accountability and operational excellence into the People function
• Introduce smarter tooling, automation and AI-enabled workflows where appropriate

You will bring:

• Experience leading People Operations within a high-growth technology environment
• A strong track record of building operational infrastructure during periods of rapid growth and ambiguity
• Deep understanding of global people operations, systems, compliance and scaling practices
• A hands-on, builder mentality with the ability to move seamlessly between strategy and execution
• Strong leadership capability with the confidence to coach, challenge and hold teams accountable
• A commercially minded and highly pragmatic approach
• Comfort operating in fast-paced, evolving environments where priorities shift quickly
• A curious mindset around AI, tooling and operational innovation
• High levels of humility, drive and emotional intelligence

We recognise how challenging this current job market is for candidates, and Hawkwood are therefore striving to provide the best candidate experience we can.

If you are interested in this opportunity, we kindly ask that you apply directly via this LinkedIn advert rather than email or LinkedIn message. This helps us ensure every candidate receives a fair, consistent, and structured experience throughout the process.