Founding Recruiter

Icarus; El Segundo (CA); On-site; USD 130,000 - 170,000; Full time

Benefits offered by this job

Meaningful equity

Top market salary and bonuses

Health, dental, and vision insurance

Real ownership, real hardware, real飞行

Small team, massive responsibility

High signal (engineering) culture

Dream desk setup

Daily lunch

Job summary

Icarus is seeking a Founding Recruiter to own the candidate journey from outbound sourcing to signed offers for engineering, manufacturing, flight operations, and business roles. You will build recruiting systems, partner with leaders, and drive hiring at our El Segundo facility.

You will own sourcing, interviewing, offers, and closing while developing talent maps and strategic outreach to fill highly technical roles critical to our stratospheric mission.

Qualifications

• 3+ years of recruiting experience for technical roles
• Experience recruiting for hardware, aerospace, defense, robotics or similar
• Strong sourcing instincts beyond obvious keywords
• Ability to understand candidate projects and relevance of experience
• Clear writing, good judgment, and trust with hiring managers
• Able to manage multiple searches and shifting priorities
• Personal ownership and problem-solving
• Willingness to work at El Segundo factory five days a week

Responsibilities

• Recruit end-to-end: source, screen, interview, offer, and close across engineering, manufacturing, flight operations and business
• Outbound sourcing and talent mapping through outreach, referrals, communities, and research
• Partner with hiring managers to translate needs into clear role specs and interview plans
• Build candidate relationships and convey mission and work expectations
• Manage offers with leadership and guide relocation decisions
• Maintain recruiting operations in Greenhouse and keep interviews moving
• Track sourcing effectiveness, conversion rates, and time-to-hire, optimize bottlenecks
• Craft compelling job descriptions from on-site work in factory environments

Skills

Sourcing and closing

Hardware recruiting

Aerospace recruitment

Technical curiosity

Written communication

Multi-search management

Stakeholder management

On-site coordination

Job description

Icarus was founded on the belief that the Stratosphere is the Forgotten Frontier and that reclaiming it will define the next era of aerospace and what is possible from the sky. We build solar-powered aircraft that fly at 60,000 ft for weeks at a time, delivering persistent, affordable, and scalable presence from this layer of the atmosphere. Getting there requires exceptional engineers, technicians, and operators. You will help bring them here.

Mission

Re-establish and maintain dominance in the Stratosphere.

The role

As a Founding Recruiter, you will own recruiting from the first outbound message to the signed offer. You’ll work directly with the CEO and hiring managers to understand what we need, find exceptional people, and convince them to build with us.You should love the search: finding the engineer behind an impressive project, getting a response from someone who wasn’t looking, and turning a first conversation into a hire. You’ll build the recruiting systems that help Icarus grow while staying close to the work yourself.

What You’ll own

• Recruiting from start to finish. Source, screen, coordinate interviews, manage offers, and close candidates across engineering, manufacturing, flight operations, and business.
• Outbound sourcing. Build targeted talent maps and reach people through thoughtful outreach, referrals, technical communities, and creative research.
• Hiring manager partnerships. Translate technical needs into clear role requirements, interview plans, and evidence of what great looks like.
• Candidate relationships. Learn what motivates each person, communicate clearly, and help them understand the mission, the work, and the expectations.
• Closing. Work with leadership on offers, address concerns early, and guide candidates through decisions and relocation.
• Recruiting operations. Keep Greenhouse accurate, interviews moving, and feedback timely. Build practical systems that save the team time.
• Results. Track sourcing effectiveness, interview conversion, offer acceptance, and time to hire. Find bottlenecks and fix them.
• Our recruiting story. Turn the work happening in the factory and the field into compelling job descriptions, outreach, and candidate conversations.

What we're looking for

• 3+ years of recruiting experience with a record of sourcing and closing difficult technical roles.
• Experience recruiting for hardware, aerospace, defense, robotics, manufacturing, or another technically demanding environment.
• Strong sourcing instincts. You know how to find people beyond the obvious companies and keywords.
• Enough technical curiosity to understand what candidates have built and why their experience matters.
• Clear writing, strong judgment, and the ability to earn trust with candidates and demanding hiring managers.
• Comfort managing multiple searches and changing priorities while keeping commitments.
• Personal ownership of outcomes. You follow through, spot problems early, and improve what isn’t working.
• Ability to work at our El Segundo factory five days a week.

Bonus

• Helped build recruiting at an early-stage company.
• Hired across mechanical, electrical, embedded software, RF, GNC, or flight test disciplines.
• Built strong networks in aerospace, defense, or hardware.
• Created referral programs, university relationships, or technical events that produced exceptional hires.

Why Icarus

• Meaningful equity
• Top market salary and bonuses
• Health, dental, and vision insurance
• Real ownership, real hardware, real flight
• Small team, massive responsibility
• High signal (engineering) to noise (management) culture
• Dream desk setup
• Daily lunch

Hiring process

• Phone screen
• One-on-one with CEO
• Meet the team in-person

US salary range

$130,000 - $170,000 USD

The salary range for this role is an estimate based on a wide range of compensation factors, inclusive of base salary only. Actual salary may vary based on (but not limited to) work experience, education and/or training, critical skills, and/or business considerations. Highly competitive equity grants are considered part of Icarus' total compensation package.

We’re an equal opportunity employer. We welcome all applicants without attention to race, color, religion, sex, sexual orientation, gender identity, national origin, veteran or disability status.

All employees work on-site at our Los Angeles facility five days a week — we don't offer remote or hybrid arrangements. If you're relocating, we'll support your move. Can you commit to working on-site full-time?

Voluntary Self-Identification

For government reporting purposes, we ask candidates to respond to the below self-identification survey.Completion of the form is entirely voluntary. Whatever your decision, it will not be considered in the hiringprocess or thereafter. Any information that you do provide will be recorded and maintained in aconfidential file.

As set forth in Icarus’s Equal Employment Opportunity policy,we do not discriminate on the basis of any protected group status under any applicable law.

If you believe you belong to any of the categories of protected veterans listed below, please indicate by making the appropriate selection.As a government contractor subject to the Vietnam Era Veterans Readjustment Assistance Act (VEVRAA), we request this information in order to measurethe effectiveness of the outreach and positive recruitment efforts we undertake pursuant to VEVRAA. Classification of protected categoriesis as follows:

A "disabled veteran" is one of the following: a veteran of the U.S. military, ground, naval or air service who is entitled to compensation (or who but for the receipt of military retired pay would be entitled to compensation) under laws administered by the Secretary of Veterans Affairs; or a person who was discharged or released from active duty because of a service-connected disability.

A "recently separated veteran" means any veteran during the three-year period beginning on the date of such veteran's discharge or release from active duty in the U.S. military, ground, naval, or air service.

An "active duty wartime or campaign badge veteran" means a veteran who served on active duty in the U.S. military, ground, naval or air service during a war, or in a campaign or expedition for which a campaign badge has been authorized under the laws administered by the Department of Defense.

An "Armed forces service medal veteran" means a veteran who, while serving on active duty in the U.S. military, ground, naval or air service, participated in a United States military operation for which an Armed Forces service medal was awarded pursuant to Executive Order 12985.