Senior Technical Recruiter

Description

The company builds automated assembly and production capability for robotics companies and for hardware that matters to national security. Its work is building robots that build robots, with the aim of making US manufacturing more AI-driven, assembly-focused and dual-use.

The company is young and early in its growth, and the team is small enough that each hire shapes the product and the culture.

This role is 100% in person at the Emeryville, CA office.

Responsibilities

• You own the engineering path from a research result to a machine that can be built again and again: mechanical design, manufacturing and process engineering, and quality.
• You own the commercial relationship with the staffing agency that supplies the hourly contract technicians who keep the production floor staffed.
• You own end-to-end hiring for mechanical, manufacturing, process, test and quality engineers.
• You build a competency map with the hiring manager before any requisition opens, breaking each role into skills that can be assessed.
• You design and run interviewer training and calibration for manufacturing and mechanical interview loops, including floor leads who have never interviewed anyone.
• You run talent competitor analysis across contract manufacturers, hardware startups, aerospace and automotive.
• You manage the agency for hourly contract technicians: choosing it, negotiating rates, setting SLAs, scorecards and quality standards, with support from the VP People.
• You hold the agency to the company's own hiring bar. You define the screen, audit the candidates it sends, track conversion and 90-day retention of placed contractors, and replace the agency if quality falls short.

Requirements

• You work like an owner. You move fast, take responsibility, and find a way forward when the path is unclear. You take bold, well-judged risks.
• If you need a clearly defined lane, a steady pace, and every answer before you start, this company may not be a good fit.
• You have 5+ years of technical recruiting, including hiring mechanical, manufacturing or quality engineers under real time pressure in a hardware setting.
• You can discuss tolerance stack-ups, DFM, GD&T and the difference between EVT and PVT builds, and you know when to ask an engineer instead of guessing.
• You have managed a staffing agency relationship, improved it, and told the agency directly when its quality was not good enough.
• You are comfortable working on a shop floor in steel toes and safety glasses.
• You have built a competency map, not just filled one in, and you have trained non-recruiters to interview well and kept that training in use.
• You use AI tools to multiply your sourcing output rather than working through lists by hand.
• You will tell a leader under deadline pressure that a candidate is a no-hire, and you will hold that position.
• You have experience with contract manufacturing, production ramps, or high-mix, low-volume environments.
• You have hired into ITAR-controlled programs, including the limits on who can be a contractor.
• You have staffed second and third shifts.
• You can sell equity at a young company. Cash packages here are not Big Tech pay, so you need to know specifically what sets this company apart.
• Agency management takes up about a third of this job. If you only want to run engineering searches, this is not the right seat.
• When a build falls behind, pressure to lower the bar comes fast, often from people you like, and you need to resist it.

Conditions

This is a full-time position based 100% in person in Emeryville, CA.

The base salary range is $145,000 - $180,000 USD. Where a candidate lands depends on location, job-related skills, experience, interview performance, and relevant education or training.

Eligible roles also receive equity, subject to Board of Directors approval.

The company practices ethical hiring.

Benefits

• You work alongside manufacturing operators, mechanical engineers, robotics researchers and software engineers in one room, building production systems together.
• Eligible employees receive equity, subject to Board of Directors approval.
• Benefits include comprehensive health, dental and vision coverage, and generous PTO, among others.