Pearl Talent - People Operations Lead

About this role

We're hiring a People Operations Lead for Pearl, which finds exceptional talent from around the world, trains them to be AI-native, and places them into operational roles at startups as managed contractors: from client-facing roles to software engineers to executive assistants. We're 3x founders who’ve bootstrapped our company to $10M+ in ARR and are adding six to seven figures in net new annualized revenue each month. Our clients span venture-backed tech and healthcare, including fast-growing startups and phenomenal US-based businesses that have raised over $3B in funding from Sequoia, a16z, Founders Fund, Y Combinator, and other top VC firms.
Today we're roughly 60 people managing a few hundred talents, growing fast and into new verticals. We started Pearl because we believe that even though opportunity isn’t created equal in the world, ambitious talent is. And our goal is to scale Pearl to $100M in ARR bootstrapped by placing 2777 operators into top startups in the next 3 years.
Hear why we exist, what we believe in, and who we’re building for: Watch here
Location: Fully Remote
Purpose of Your Role
You'll own the internal operating system that keeps Pearl running as we grow from a few million to $100M in revenue.
Right now, a lot of how Pearl runs internally still depends on the founders: onboarding new leaders, chasing end-of-week reports, preparing all hands, keeping sprints on track, and deciding which meetings are worth everyone's time. That works at 60 people. It won't work at 200. We need someone who takes all of that off our plates and does it better than we do.
This is an internal role. You'll build and run the systems that help every team at Pearl grow, get feedback, stay aligned, and execute: how people progress, how they're onboarded, how they give and receive feedback, how the company comes together at all hands, and how work moves week to week. You'll work directly with both founders and every department lead, and you'll be the person who makes sure the things we agree on actually happen.
Beyond running our operating systems, you'll be a force multiplier for the founders on the messy, high-leverage internal initiatives that don't have an owner yet. When we need something new stood up, like finding the right lawyers, choosing an accounting firm, or getting ahead of a compliance requirement, you take the ambiguous ask, figure out what good looks like, and own it until it's done.
What You'll Own
1. Progression, Banding, Scorecards, and Reviews

• Build a clear progression banding system that works consistently across every org at Pearl, so everyone knows what the next level looks like and what it takes to get there.

• Organize our Scorecard system so it's simple enough that people actually do it, and so everyone receives feedback consistently.

• Connect banding, scorecards, and feedback into our 2x a year review and progression cycle, so promotions and growth conversations are consistent and fair across teams.

• Run the review cycle end to end: timelines, reminders, calibration, and follow-through.

2. Onboarding and Pearl Drivers Ed

• Standardize how new team members are onboarded across Pearl, including 30-60-90 day plans, first-week setup, and the check-ins that help new hires ramp quickly.

• Build and run Pearl Drivers Ed: the shared program that teaches every new hire how Pearl works, how we operate, and what great looks like here.

• Make sure new leaders, including new directors, have clear milestones and initiatives from day one.

3. All Hands

• Run our all hands from start to finish.

• Collate the data from across the company, decide who is speaking, and craft a story that connects what each team is doing to where Pearl is going.

• Keep all hands sharp, prepared, and worth everyone's time.

4. Operating Rhythm: End-of-Week Checks and Sprints

• Run end-of-week (EOW) checks with the different department leads, so reports come in on time and the founders can see what moved, what's stuck, and what needs attention.

• Help manage sprints across the company: set priorities, track progress, and make sure what we commit to gets done.

• Support our weekly and monthly data reviews, so leads are looking at the right numbers, both lagging indicators and trends.

5. Meeting Quality

• Own the question: are all the meetings happening across the company high value?

• Audit recurring meetings, cut or merge the ones that aren't earning their time, and make sure the rest have clear owners, agendas, and outcomes.

• Design formats that keep meetings engaging, such as rotating who leads and presents.

6. Founder Leverage

• Support the founders on the highest-leverage internal work wherever it's needed, including cleanup projects that don't yet have an owner.

• Clean up our internal processes and documentation on Notion and Docs, so the right information is easy to find and up to date.

• Act as the connective tissue between the founders and department leads, turning decisions into owners, timelines, and follow-through.

7. Founder-Directed Special Projects and New Initiatives

• Own the new initiatives the founders need stood up, end to end: scope the problem, research options, run the process, make a recommendation, and drive it to a decision and a working outcome.

• Examples include finding and onboarding the right legal counsel, selecting and transitioning to the right accounting firm, and leading compliance work as Pearl grows into new verticals and geographies. These are examples, not the full list: expect a steady stream of new, often ambiguous asks.

• Manage the outside partners these projects bring in (law firms, accountants, advisors, vendors), keeping them on scope, on timeline, and on budget.

• Once something is stood up, turn it into a repeatable process or hand it to a clear owner, so it doesn't fall back on the founders.

What Success Looks Like
Within your first 90 days, you've taken over the weekly operating rhythm from the founders. EOW reports come in…