People Operations Generalist

salientmotion; Torrance (CA); Hybrid; USD 110,000 - 160,000; Full time

Benefits offered by this job

Relocation assistance

Great benefits

HQ in Hawthorne, CA

Flexible onsite/onsite options

Job summary

Salient Motion is hiring the first dedicated People Ops hire to build and own our operational HR infrastructure in a fast-scaling startup. You will manage onboarding, compliance, HRIS, payroll and benefits, and support recruiting operations across the employee lifecycle.

You will partner with managers on end-to-end onboarding, open enrollment, I-9 and ITAR compliance, and visa coordination with outside counsel, while also owning culture initiatives and policy maintenance.

Qualifications

• Experience in People Ops and recruiting.
• Proficient with Rippling, Greenhouse, and related tools.
• Payroll and benefits administration experience.
• California and federal employment compliance knowledge.
• ITAR documentation at offer stage.
• Strong organizational and communication skills.

Responsibilities

• Own HRIS administration: records, workflows, onboarding automation, data integrity.
• Oversee onboarding end-to-end: pre-boarding, Day 1, 30/60/90 check-ins.
• Administer benefits: open enrollment, carrier coordination, employee questions.
• Ensure compliance: I-9, California and federal employment laws, policy maintenance.
• Coordinate visa/immigration in partnership with outside counsel; manage petition support and timelines.
• Payroll support: address employee questions; ensure timely approvals before deadlines.
• Own culture and engagement cadence: pulse surveys and leadership insights.
• Own company policy: employee handbook, PTO, code of conduct.

Skills

HRIS administration

Onboarding

Benefits administration

Compliance

Payroll support

Recruiting operations

Culture & engagement

Policy ownership

Tools

Rippling

Greenhouse

DocuSign

Checkr

Juicebox

Job description

Who We Are

Salient Motion designs, manufactures, and supports advanced motion control and actuation systems for aerospace, defense, and robotics applications. We're a fast-growing, venture-backed startup building the next generation of intelligent motion systems, partnering directly with leading organizations to bring new technology from concept to deployment.

About the Role

This is the first dedicated People Ops hire at Salient Motion. You are coming in at a moment when the company is scaling fast enough that we need someone who can build and own the operational infrastructure that keeps everything running: onboarding, compliance, HRIS, payroll and benefits (and more). You will also support recruiting operations as we build out the talent function, which means you will touch the full employee lifecycle from candidate to day one and beyond.

A couple other things:

• We are open to relocating you
• We have great benefits
• We are well funded, and generating revenue
• We just moved into a new large HQ in Hawthorne, CA, with presence still in Torrance, CA
• We need folks onsite, but provide a lot of flexibilty

What you'll do:

People Operations

• HRIS administration in Rippling: employee records, workflows, onboarding automation, and data integrity
• Onboarding end to end: pre-boarding, Day 1 coordination, and 30/60/90 day check-ins in partnership with managers
• Benefits administration: open enrollment, carrier coordination, employee questions, and day-to-day benefits support
• Compliance: I-9 management, employment law adherence (California and federal), required policy maintenance, and ITAR documentation at offer stage
• Visa and immigration coordination in partnership with outside counsel: includes preparing job descriptions and role documentation for petition support, coordinating the recruiting process to meet visa timeline requirements, managing case tracking and document collection, and serving as the internal point of contact between employees, managers, and counsel throughout the process
• Payroll support: first point of contact for employee questions and discrepancies related to payroll. You are not running payroll, but you are making sure issues get resolved and managers are approving timesheets before processing deadlines
• Culture and engagement: own the cadence of pulse surveys and engagement check-ins, synthesize results into actionable insights for the Head of People and leadership, and serve as a visible, approachable presence on the floor. You are the day-to-day read on how the team is doing, what is working, and what is not
• Company policy ownership: employee handbook, PTO policy, code of conduct, and required state and federal postings

Recruiting Support

• Job posting management: publish and maintain open roles on the Salient Motion careers page and LinkedIn, keep postings current, and ensure all listings include required ITAR and location language
• Interview coordination: schedule 1:1 interviews across all active reqs and coordinate post-interview roundtable discussions where interviewers align on candidate feedback before a decision is made
• Candidate experience: serve as the primary point of contact and host for all onsite candidates. You are the first face they see when they walk in and the last when they leave. Own everything in between: greeting, logistics, escorting between interviews, and making sure the day runs on time and feels organized. The candidate experience is a direct reflection of who we are as a company
• Offer routing: manage the offer workflow end to end in Greenhouse: routing for approval, generating offer letters, managing DocuSign, and tracking acceptance
• Juicebox administration: support the Recruiting team in managing outreach agent briefs, monitoring sequence performance, and keeping candidate data clean
• Greenhouse hygiene: stage updates, candidate disposition, background check coordination via Checkr, and pipeline reporting support

What you need:

Experience matters less than how you operate. Here is what we actually value in this role.

You can hold a lot at once. This role lives at the intersection of People Ops and recruiting, and the context switches constantly. One hour you are resolving a payroll discrepancy, the next you are hosting a candidate onsite, the next you are updating a job posting. You do not drop things when the day changes direction.

You learn fast and go deep. You do not need to be an employment lawyer to understand California compliance, but you are not afraid to dig in until you do. Same with systems. Rippling, Greenhouse, Juicebox: you get your hands on a tool and you master it. You do not stay at the surface level

You move before you are asked. You see around corners. You spot the timesheet that has not been approved before payroll closes, the compliance requirement coming before it becomes a problem, the candidate who has been waiting too long for a follow-up. You bring solutions, not just observations. This is core to who we are **as a compa**