Posted Mar 22, 2026
As our People Operations Manager, you are the architect of our internal team experience and our corporate foundation. Reporting to the COO, you will be driving our People Operations and the employee experience by balancing high-touch people management with high-stakes Business Operations. We are looking for a sharp, analytically-minded "fast-riser" who wants to master the internal mechanics of a Series B startup—from scaling our employee engagement and global benefits to managing equity grants and corporate governance. # Key Responsibilities
Must-haves:
2–4 years of experience in an operational, generalist, or analytical role with a lean to people empathy (e.g., startup ops, consulting, or project management). - A track record of building or improving processes in fast-changing startup environments. You're quick to spot something sub-optimal, designed a fix, and see it through. - Comfort connecting the dots across different operational domains (People, Finance, Legal). You understand how a change in one area ripples into others. - High "numerical intuition": Comfort with Excel/Google Sheets for managing data-heavy tasks like equity grants, payroll inputs, or survey analysis. - A versatile communicator who can handle sensitive employee topics with empathy and technical legal documents with precision. - Ability to be in the Amsterdam or Zurich office at least 3 days a week. Nice-to-haves:
Experience with equity/ESOP platforms (e.g., Ledgy, Carta). - Prior exposure to Dutch or Swiss labor regulations. Our commitment to inclusive hiring
Cradle evaluates all candidates based on merit, regardless of sex, gender, ethnicity, socio-economic background, or any other aspect of identity. We maintain zero tolerance for discrimination and actively encourage candidates from all backgrounds to apply. AI disclosure
Cradle uses an applicant tracking system that includes basic AI-assisted features which may generate scores or rankings based on how applications match a job description. These outputs are not used to make or meaningfully influence hiring decisions — all candidates are evaluated through a thorough, human-led review by our recruiting team. A notice about recruitment scams
Please be aware that scammers are posing as us in order to get your personal details or money. We only communicate via @cradle.bio email addresses, we only make job offers after having met you in person at our office in Zurich or Amsterdam, and we never ask you to pay for anything during the interview process.
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