Founding Senior HR Generalist / People Operations Lead
About the role
We are looking for a Founding Senior HR Generalist / People Operations Lead with 4–7 years of experience to take full ownership of the HR function at Giga — a fast-scaling AI startup that just raised a $61M Series A and is trusted by enterprise customers like DoorDash. This is a true greenfield opportunity: no one at the company does HR full time right now, meaning you'll be stepping in to bring professional structure, best practices, and real ownership to a function that's been run on the side by the CEO. You'll be the first dedicated HR hire, which means the sky is the limit for what you can build — and the trust you earn through nailing the operational fundamentals will unlock the space to shape everything from onboarding to performance management as the company scales.
What will you be doing?
- Take over day-to-day HR operations — own the full employee lifecycle including onboarding, offboarding, role changes, offer letters, and employment documentation
- Keep Rippling clean and up-to-date, serving as the internal owner for all HR systems and processes
- Apply strong knowledge of California employment law to handle employee transitions, terminations, and compliance with care and consistency
- Manage benefits administration (health plans, 401k, broker relationships) and partner closely with Finance on payroll accuracy
- Gain trust and social capital across the team in the first 30–60 days, then begin introducing scalable processes like structured onboarding and, eventually, performance review cycles