Senior Technical Recruiter

Cardless; San Francisco (CA); On-site; USD 185,000 - 210,000; Full time

Benefits offered by this job

Equity

Health coverage

Catered lunches

Commuter benefit

Parental leave

Team events & happy hours

Flexible PTO

Apple equipment

401k plan

Job summary

Cardless, headquartered in San Francisco, seeks a Senior Technical Recruiter to own full-cycle hiring for engineers and technical leaders. You will partner with engineering leadership and build scalable hiring playbooks for a fast-growing fintech infrastructure company.

You will engage top engineers in the SF market, craft competitive offers, and shape the recruiting engine for scale, with equity and benefits supporting a disruptive product roadmap.

Qualifications

• 5+ years of full-cycle technical recruiting, with a track record of closing senior and staff-level engineers.
• Experience recruiting at a high-growth, venture-backed startup; fintech or infrastructure background is a plus.
• Deep knowledge of the SF engineering market and compensation trends.
• Expert outbound sourcing to identify top engineers and engage them effectively.
• Proven ability to close candidates against competing offers and explain equity/ leveling.
• Able to manage multiple high-priority searches with strong prioritization and autonomy.

Responsibilities

• Own the full cycle: intake, market mapping, outbound, interview loops, debriefs and close.
• Hunt passive engineers with sophisticated sourcing and a white-glove candidate experience.
• Advise engineering leadership with market data on talent and compensation.
• Build offer strategies and win candidates comparing us to top Bay Area companies.
• Design and improve structured interview frameworks and recruitment programs.
• Track pipeline health, conversion and time-to-hire, and report to leadership.

Skills

Technical recruiting depth

Startup experience

San Francisco network

Sourcing craft

Closing ability

Ownership and judgment

Job description

About Cardless

Cardless is building the infrastructure for the world's best companies to design, build, and launch financial products. Companies like Coinbase and Bilt use Cardless to create credit cards that feel entirely their own. In an industry where branded financial products usually mean shared logos and shared control, Cardless is built to disappear. Our APIs and components shape the journey from the first application to every purchase, reward, and moment of support that follows, while we handle lending, compliance, and operations behind the scenes.

In September 2025, we raised a $60 million Series C led by Spark Capital, bringing our total funding to $170 million. The team is over 70 people and scaling toward profitability by year-end 2026.

We're looking for kind, humble people with high standards and low egos. We take the work seriously without taking ourselves too seriously. We see what could be improved, make it so, and leave every product, system, and team better than we found it.

About the Role

Cardless has found product-market fit, has live card programs with brands like Coinbase and Bilt, and is growing fast. The next chapter depends on one thing more than any other: hiring the engineers, data scientists and technical leaders who will build the infrastructure behind those programs.

As one of the first technical recruiters at Cardless, you will own full-cycle hiring for our most critical engineering searches, from staff-level backend engineers to the leaders who will build out entire teams. You will work directly with engineering leadership, and because the team is small, the playbooks, interview processes and hiring bar you put in place now will become the template for how we hire for years to come.

What You Will Do

• Own the full cycle. Run every search end to end: intake, market mapping, outbound, interview loops, debriefs and close. You are accountable for the hire, not just the pipeline.

• Hunt the best of the best. Find and engage passive engineers with sophisticated sourcing techniques and a white-glove candidate experience throughout.

• Advise engineering leadership. Push back on requirements, bring market data on talent and comp, and act as a true partner to hiring managers on who to hire and how to win them.

• Close top talent against top offers. Build offer strategies, explain early-stage equity clearly, and win candidates who are weighing us against the strongest companies in the Bay Area.

• Build the recruiting engine for scale. Design and improve structured interview frameworks, processes, programs and systems.

• Report on what matters. Track pipeline health, conversion and time-to-hire, and use that data to tell leadership where hiring is on track and where it isn't.

What We Look For

• Technical Recruiting Depth: 5+ years of full-cycle technical recruiting, with a track record of closing senior and staff-level engineers.

• Startup Experience: You have recruited at a high-growth, venture-backed startup and know how to build process where none exists. Fintech or infrastructure experience is a plus.

• San Francisco Network: You know the SF engineering market: who the strongest teams are, what they pay and how to get their engineers on the phone.

• Sourcing Craft: You are an expert outbound recruiter. You can connect with engineers seamlessly and can identify the top 10% through thoughtful calibration.

• Closing Ability: You have personally closed candidates against competing offers from top-tier companies and can speak fluently about comp, equity and leveling.

• Ownership and Judgment: You hold a high bar, manage your own priorities across several critical searches, and do not need to be managed at the activity level.

Compensation

This role has an annual starting salary range of $185,000-$210,000 + equity + benefits. Actual compensation is influenced by a wide array of factors including but not limited to skills, experience, and specific work location.

Benefits

We're proud to offer our team excellent benefits:

Meaningful Start-up equity

100% health, vision & dental primary coverage

75% health, vision & dental dependent coverage

Catered lunches

$250/month Commuter benefit

Parental leave

Team building events & happy hours

Flexible PTO with a minimum of 15 days off per year

Apple equipment

401k plan

Location

We're headquartered in San Francisco, CA, with a beautiful office in Jackson Square. We’re in the office at least three days a week, and most of us are there more than that, because we do our best thinking and building together in person. We’re looking for someone who’s genuinely excited to be there alongside the team.