About the Role

This role sits at the intersection of talent scouting, venture creation, and ecosystem building. Instead of hiring for existing jobs, you’ll identify and engage people who should be founders—and help shape the early teams that will build new startups.

You will run the full lifecycle of founder discovery: mapping the ecosystem, sourcing prospects, forming relationships, conducting strategic conversations, and shaping early hypotheses around potential company formation.

This is both strategic and hands-on, suited for someone who thrives in fast-moving environments, enjoys experimenting with unconventional channels, and operates comfortably without step-by-step playbooks.

Compensation: $180,000 - $200,000 base salary (negotiable based on experience) plus bonus and equity.

Location: In-office in San Francisco, with flexibility for occasional remote work. Candidates must live in the San Francisco area and be willing to work primilarly onsite.

What this company offer you:

• Medical
• Dental
• Paid Holidays
• Flexible PTO options
• 401(k) investment retirement account access
• The ability to shape the future of many tech company customers
• Opportunity to grow into more senior level roles with the company as we grow

Responsibilities

• Lead a structured sourcing and engagement motion that identifies high-potential founders, operators, technologists, and builders.
• Design and manage a pipeline of future-founder talent, including outreach, relationship development, evaluation, and partner alignment.
• Conduct deep conversations that assess founder mindset, leadership style, risk tolerance, strategic thinking, and venture potential.
• Map and activate talent networks across startup, venture, product, engineering, consulting, and academic ecosystems.
• Create and refine narratives, touchpoints, and micro-experiences that attract entrepreneurial talent (content, dinners, events, roundtables, etc.).
• Explore non-traditional channels such as founder collectives, open source communities, operator networks, and early-stage programs.
• Work closely with leadership to synthesize signals, evaluate founder-market fit, and accelerate high-potential opportunities.
• Build a perspective on patterns of success and failure in early-stage talent, and use that insight to refine sourcing strategies.
• Maintain a fast, experimental approach to talent discovery—testing new tactics, iterating, and continuously optimizing for velocity and quality.

Who You Are

A high-energy, ecosystem-oriented operator who loves meeting people, exploring problems, and connecting dots across markets, technology, and talent. You enjoy autonomy, ambiguity, and extreme ownership.

You can think strategically, communicate clearly, and move quickly between research, execution, and relationship building.

Preferred Experience (3–6 years)

Experience in one or more of the following areas:

• Venture capital (analyst, associate, platform, or fellowship programs)
• Strategy consulting or MBA-track roles with early-stage exposure
• Founder’s Office, Strategy, or Chief of Staff roles in early-stage tech
• Early talent builders at small startups (first or second recruiter)
• Startup generalist roles with broad responsibility and fast execution

Key Traits

• Highly extroverted, charismatic, and comfortable networking daily
• Sharp, fast learner who can synthesize information quickly
• Strategic thinker with the ability to discuss markets, theses, and ideas
• Creative problem-solver who enjoys experimentation
• Proactive operator who owns outcomes end-to-end
• Humble, curious, adaptable, and coachable

What You Must Bring

• Ability to run sourcing motions independently without operational support
• Comfort navigating ambiguous, dynamic environments
• High emotional intelligence and conversational depth
• Strong writing, communication, and synthesis skills
• Ability to influence technical or entrepreneurial talent

Who Will Not Be a Fit

• Traditional recruiters from large, process-driven environments
• Candidates who rely on rigid playbooks or structured orgs
• People looking to impose their own founder agenda
• Ego-driven “chief of staff” archetypes
• Talent that requires heavy direction, templates, or guardrails

Where Strong Talent Often Comes From

(Not requirements, just signals.)

• VC analyst/associate cohorts and platform programs
• Early-career founder-support roles at seed-stage companies
• Early-stage recruiters who operated with high independence
• Startup Chief of Staff / Founder’s Office with genuine ecosystem orientation
• Recent grads (1–4 years out) from top universities with early-stage experience

What You’ll Gain

• A rare opportunity to influence multiple startups from day zero
• Direct access to founders, operators, and investors shaping new ventures
• Career pathways into company leadership, venture, or founding roles
• Competitive compensation and meaningful equity

Ideal Profile Summary

This role is not about running a talent acquisition function.

It’s about identifying high-potential founders before they start companies, building trusted relationships, and helping shape opportunities worth pursuing.

The strongest fits tend to be:

• Early-career venture or strategy talent who wants to be closer to creation, or
• Small-startup generalists who “did everything” and thrive in unstructured work.

If you enjoy thinking about markets, talking to entrepreneurial people, attending events, testing ideas, and building relationships that lead to company formation—this role offers an unusually high leverage platform.

Who is Rainier Recruiting?

Rainier Recruiting is a boutique, award winning national staffing agency and executive search firm. Using an approach that “treats every candidate like an executive search”, we offer positions in contract-to-hire, Full-Time, and executive search. Named the #1 Best Workplace in Washington State in 2022, recognized as a ClearlyRated Best of Staffing firm, and identified as a top recruitment firm by multiple business journals, Rainier Recruiting is fast becoming a respected company. We are no longer the “best recruiters you have never heard of”. Rainier Recruiting is also proud to share our clients have a 93% repeat business rate. Rainier Recruiting is an equal opportunity employer and service provider and does not discriminate on the basis of race, religion, gender, gender identity, national origin, citizenship status, sexual orientation, disability, political affiliation or belief, or any other protected class. We are committed to the principles of Equal Opportunity Employment and are dedicated to making employment decisions based on merit and value, for ourselves, our client companies, and for the candidates we represent. We engage in socially conscious business practices and believe that diverse, equitable, inclusive, and non-biased talent and recruitment processes are foundational to the success of every organization that we partner with.