Sr Manager, People Experience Programs

Anduril; Costa Mesa (CA); On-site; USD 147,000 - 196,000; Full time

Job summary

Anduril Industries is seeking a Senior People Experience Program Manager to serve as the strategic and operational backbone of our People Experience function. You will connect a portfolio spanning global engagement, survey leadership, and alumni initiatives across multiple geographies.

You will partner with the Head of People Experience to shape the function, present to senior leaders, and drive cross‑functional programs from strategy through execution in a fast‑growing defense tech environment.

Qualifications

• 10+ years in people programs or program management within a People/HR function.
• Experience designing end‑to‑end employee experience or engagement programs.
• Motivated by defense mission and outcomes.
• Strong program management across multiple geographies and workstreams.
• Executive presence and communication with senior leaders (VP/C-suite).
• Experience managing enterprise‑wide stakeholder relationships across functions.
• Strategic thinking with global scope and scalable frameworks.
• Comfort with data, evaluating engagement metrics and making data‑driven recommendations.
• High ownership, low ego, and outcomes orientation.
• Thrives in fast‑paced, ambiguous environments and builds from the ground up.
• Must be a U.S. Person due to access to export controlled information.

Responsibilities

• Lead the program management and rollout of Anduril's global engagement strategy across seven sites and regions.
• Own end‑to‑end management of the company-wide engagement survey, including launch, results analysis, and action planning.
• Launch and operationalize the Anduril Alumni Program across stakeholder groups.
• Partner with the Head of People Experience to shape function strategy and invest in scalable programming.
• Serve as the primary operator across the People Experience portfolio, managing timelines and communications.
• Build strategic relationships with People Business Partners, leadership, onboarding leads, and operations.
• Use site health data to translate insights into strategic recommendations and program adjustments.
• Present strategy and outcomes to senior leadership with executive presence.
• Drive systems‑level change and build coalitions across teams and geographies.

Skills

People programs

Employee experience

Engagement programs

Program management

Executive communication

Stakeholder management

Global scope

Data-driven

Change management

Ownership mindset

Job description

Anduril Industries is a defense technology company with a mission to transform U.S. and allied military capabilities with advanced technology. By bringing the expertise, technology, and business model of the 21st century’s most innovative companies to the defense industry, Anduril is changing how military systems are designed, built and sold. Anduril’s family of systems is powered by Lattice OS, an AI-powered operating system that turns thousands of data streams into a realtime, 3D command and control center. As the world enters an era of strategic competition, Anduril is committed to bringing cutting‑edge autonomy, AI, computer vision, sensor fusion, and networking technology to the military in months, not years.

About The Team

Anduril is building the technology that will transform defense and national security. Our People team ensures the organization scales as fast as the problems we’re solving — and People Experience is at the center of how employees actually feel that scale.

People Experience is a global function responsible for the moments that shape an employee’s relationship with Anduril — from their first day through alumni status. We own the global onboarding program, the regional engagement strategy, company-wide engagement survey, the alumni program, and other engagement related programming. This role sits within that umbrella but is focused on the regional engagement strategy, employee listening, and the alumni program.

The People Experience function is being built, not maintained — we are actively defining the operating model and programming portfolio. This role will be instrumental in shaping and informing that build alongside the Head of People Experience. If you want to inherit a playbook, this isn’t the role. If you want to write one, keep reading.

About The Job

We are looking for a Senior People Experience Program Manager to serve as the strategic and operational backbone of Anduril's People Experience function. You will be the connective tissue across a portfolio that includes a global regionalized engagement strategy, the company-wide engagement survey, an alumni program, and the ongoing definition of what People Experience means at a defense technology company that is rapidly expanding.

This role is equal parts strategist and program manager. You will partner directly with the Head of People Experience to shape the function’s direction — and then you’ll be the one who makes it real. You need to be comfortable presenting to senior leadership, managing complex cross‑functional programs across multiple geographies, and adapting your approach for different site populations and contexts.

What You’ll Do

• Lead the program management and rollout of Anduril's global engagement strategy — a regionalized model designed to understand and address site‑level engagement challenges through targeted programming across seven sites and regions worldwide.
• Own the end‑to‑end program management of the company-wide engagement survey, including launch planning, results analysis, communication strategy, and driving accountability for action planning across business units.
• Help launch and operationalize the Anduril Alumni Program, managing the program's day‑to‑day execution and implementation effort along various stakeholder groups.
• Partner with the Head of People Experience to shape and inform the function itself — identifying gaps in the employee experience, proposing new programming, building the case for investment in areas the function hasn't yet reached, and designing the frameworks and systems that will define how People Experience operates at scale.
• Serve as the primary program operator across the People Experience portfolio: building project plans, managing timelines, running stakeholder communications, and keeping complex multi‑workstream initiatives on track.
• Build and manage strategic stakeholder relationships across the People organization — including People Business Partners, People Leadership and Development, Onboarding Regional Leads, and the People Experience Operations Manager — navigating competing priorities, building buy‑in, and maintaining trust across a complex partner network.
• Work closely with our People Experience Operations Manager to leverage site health data, engagement metrics, and quality‑of‑hire insights — translating data into strategic recommendations and program adjustments.
• Present program strategy, progress, and outcomes to senior leadership with clarity, confidence, and full executive presence — translating operational detail into a strategic narrative that shapes organizational direction.
• Drive systems‑level change: identify where processes, structures, or ways of working need to shift to support the engagement strategy, and build the coalitions to make those changes stick. You will lead change initiatives that span multiple teams and geographies, anticipating ripple effects and designing for interdependencies.
• Create new frameworks and systems where none exist — this function is being built, and you will be expected to design program architecture, evaluation methodology, and feedback loops rather than adapting existing ones.

Required Qualifications

• 10+ years of experience in people programs, employee experience, engagement, organizational development, or program management within a People/HR function.
• Demonstrated experience designing, implementing, and evaluating employee experience or engagement programs end‑to‑end — not just executing someone else’s playbook, but owning the full lifecycle from strategy through execution.
• You are motivated by our mission. We are working to solve the biggest problems in defense.
• Strong program management skills: you build structure in ambiguous environments, manage multiple concurrent workstreams, and drive complex cross‑functional work to completion without waiting to be told what to do.
• Executive presence and communication skills that allow you to present confidently to senior leaders at the VP and C‑suite level.
• Experience managing enterprise‑wide stakeholder relationships (VP+ level) across multiple functions — you build strategic alliances, navigate competing priorities, and influence organizational direction through those relationships.
• Strategic thinking with global scope: you connect individual site‑level programs to a coherent enterprise strategy, define the frameworks others execute against, and think about how decisions scale before you make them.
• Comfort with data: you can interpret engagement data, design evaluation methodology, build a case for investment, and adjust your approach based on what the numbers say. You think in systems — connecting employee experience outcomes to broader business strategy.
• You are both high ownership and low ego, approaching everything with strong outcome orientation and high humility.
• You thrive in fast‑paced, ambiguous environments and get energy from building something from the ground up rather than maintaining the status quo.
• Must be a U.S. Person due to required access to U.S. export controlled information or facilities.

Preferred Qualifications

• Experience at high‑growth technology or defense companies that have navigated rapid organizational scaling.
• Background in managing global or multi‑region programs across different employee personas, cultural contexts, and timezones.
• Experience managing engagement survey programs end‑to‑end, including, launch, analysis, and action planning accountability.
• Experience building a people experience, employee engagement, or similar function from scratch — defining scope, making the case, and standing it up.
• Experience driving organizational or systems‑level change management — not just launching programs, but shifting how an organization operates. You’ve anticipated systemic risks and designed mitigation strategies that protect the broader business.

US Salary Range

$147,000 — $196,000 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 offer 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 included in the majority of full time offers; and are considered part of Anduril’s total compensation package. Additionally, Anduril offers top‑tier benefits for full‑time employees, including:

Benefits

At Anduril, we invest in our people. Our comprehensive, competitive benefits package (available at little to no cost to employees) ensures you’re supported in health, recovery, and whatever comes next. For more information, Explore Our Benefits.

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By submitting your application, you consent to Anduril Industries using a third‑party service provider to conduct pre‑employment risk, integrity, and due diligence screening and assessing potential risks as part of your application process. This third‑party service provider provides risk‑intelligence services that may include analysis of sanctions and watchlists, adverse media, public‑record information, and other lawful open‑source or commercial data sources. This third‑party service provider does not act as a consumer reporting agency. Use of this provider helps to ensure compliance with applicable laws and protect technology, intellectual property, and organizational security.