Founding Recruiter

About the role

Pocket is looking for a senior recruiter to own the end‑to‑end hiring process across Engineering, Research, Marketing, Ops, Finance, GTM, and Support. This is not an HR or agency‑management role – you will source, screen, and close candidates, building the recruiting function from the ground up. In the first 90 days you will have an active ATS, scorecards and interview plans for every role, pipelines for the top priorities, and a weekly hiring rhythm.

Responsibilities

• Full‑cycle recruiting for every open role: intake, sourcing, screening, offer, and close.
• Outbound sourcing for hard‑to‑fill positions, from ML researchers to a Controller.
• Translate vague founder requests into clear role definitions, scorecards, and interview plans.
• Manage offers and closing, including salary and equity conversations together with the founders.
• Hire across the US, Europe, and India for full‑time, contractor, and intern positions.
• Own the ATS, funnel metrics, and Pocket’s candidate brand across all channels.

Requirements

• 4–6+ years of full‑cycle recruiting experience, with at least part of it in‑house at a fast‑growing startup.
• Proven track record closing both technical and business roles, with quantifiable results.
• Consistent weekly sourcing activity performed personally.
• Ability to run 10+ searches in parallel without dropping candidates.
• Skill in distinguishing strong candidates from merely polished ones and willingness to push back on poorly defined roles.
• Comfort explaining startup equity clearly and honestly to candidates.

Preferred qualifications

• First or early recruiter at a seed or Series A company.
• Experience hiring ML, speech, or LLM researchers.
• Background in consumer tech, DTC, e‑commerce, or hardware.
• International hiring experience (Europe, India), including EOR and contractor setups.
• Proficiency with AI tools to accelerate sourcing and outreach.

Why join us

You will build the talent engine for a company scaling from hundreds of thousands to millions of customers, working directly with the founders and every team lead. There is no legacy process to inherit, and the role offers a clear path to Head of Talent/People as the function grows.

Interview process

• Intro call (15 min): experience, motivation, compensation expectations, location.
• Recruiting deep dive: discuss your best searches, process, and funnel numbers.
• Practical exercise on a real Pocket role: intake, sourcing strategy, sample outreach.
• Conversations with the hiring managers you’d partner with.
• Founders interview.
• References and offer.

The entire process is designed to be completed in under two weeks.

Benefits

• Competitive salary
• Meaningful equity through Pocket’s stock option plan

About Pocket

Pocket is a Y Combinator W26 company building a premium hardware‑plus‑software product in the AI voice‑recorder space. Obsessed with quality and speed, Pocket is scaling rapidly across the US and Europe and aims to become the category leader in device experience.