People Operations Leader
Los Angeles
Confidential search — represented by AccelerateHC
Location: West San Fernando Valley, Los Angeles, CA — onsite preferred (4 days/week), hybrid considered Reports to: Chief Financial Officer Level: Individual contributor / player-coach — first dedicated HR hire
Our client is a venture-backed AI platform company in healthcare services, headquartered in the Los Angeles area. Their model is different from most companies in their space: rather than selling software, they acquire established operating businesses and migrate them onto their own AI platform.
Founded within the last several years and well funded by institutional healthcare investors, the company has completed multiple acquisitions across several verticals to date. They employ several hundred people today, most of whom joined through acquisition. The acquisition pipeline is active, and headcount is expected to grow into the high hundreds and ultimately beyond a thousand.
This is the first real HR seat at the company. Today the work is handled by the CFO with a rotating set of outside consultants. There is no HR team, no established playbook, and no one who owns the function end to end.
You would own it — building the people infrastructure of a company scaling toward 1,000+ employees, with direct executive sponsorship and outside counsel and vendors to lean on. For an operator who wants serious M&A integration reps, there are few seats like it.
The client is open on level. A strong, hands-on Manager with the right execution history and a Director who has already owned People Operations end to end at a multi-state company are both credible fits. The title will be set to the person.
Your work follows the acquisition lifecycle, and then repeats.
Pre-close diligence. Employee census, compensation and classification review, benefits and PTO liability, open claims, employment agreements, restrictive covenants, and state-specific exposure — partnering with the deal team and outside employment counsel.
Day 1 onboarding of an acquired population. Offer and transition letters, I-9s, state registrations, payroll cutover, benefits enrollment and mapping, PTO balance treatment, handbook and policy adoption, and manager communications.
Harmonization. Rationalizing inherited pay bands, titles, benefits plans, PTO and accrual policies, and holiday calendars across acquired entities into a single company standard — including building toward a universal benefits platform — without creating avoidable morale or legal problems.
Separations and workforce change. As acquired companies move onto the platform and AI agents absorb routine processing work, roles change and headcount is reduced. You will run that work: selection process and documentation, severance design and agreements, accrued vacation and PTO payouts by state rule, final-pay timing, benefits continuation, WARN and state mini-WARN analysis, and clean execution of notification days. This is a structural, recurring part of the role rather than an occasional event, and the client wants to be direct about that up front.
Ongoing compliance and HR operations. Multi-state employment compliance — wage and hour, classification, leave, pay transparency, postings and registrations — plus handbook maintenance, employee relations and investigations, unemployment and claims handling, and healthcare-adjacent requirements including HIPAA workforce training and background and exclusion screening.
Building the function. Standing up repeatable playbooks so the sixth acquisition is materially easier than the third, and deciding what stays with consultants versus what comes in-house.
Must-haves
You are a self-starter who finishes things. You set your own priorities and execute without being managed. There is no HR team and no playbook waiting for you. This matters as much as any technical skill on this list.
RIF, severance, and WARN execution. You have personally planned and executed reductions in force: selection documentation, severance design and agreements, accrued PTO and vacation payouts, final-pay rules, and WARN / mini-WARN analysis.
Multi-state employment compliance. Handbooks, wage and hour, leave laws, classification, and terminations across many states — essential given how geographically distributed the acquired employees are.
Genuinely hands-on. You have a point of view about how integration, severance, and compliance should be run, and you are equally comfortable doing the payroll cutover and writing the severance schedule yourself.
Onsite presence. You can be in the office on at least a hybrid basis.
Strongly preferred, not required
Post-close HR integration experience — personally moving acquired employee populations onto a single payroll, benefits, and HRIS stack.
Experience supporting large non-exempt workforces, and familiarity with offshore populations in India, the Philippines, or similar markets.
Rippling administration, or hands-on configuration of a comparable HRIS.
SHRM-SCP or SPHR. Welcome, never a filter.
What is not being weighted
Industry background does not matter here — healthcare and RCM experience carries no particular advantage. Neither does exact years of experience or prior title, provided the execution history is real.
This is deliberately not a culture-and-engagement seat. If your strongest work is values programming, engagement surveys, and DEI initiatives, this is not the right seat for you.
It is also not a seat for a strategist who builds the roadmap and hands it off, or for a generalist who has only administered someone else's process inside a large HR organization with shared services and legal on tap. There is no team to execute your framework and no framework to execute.
The people who do well here are unbothered by ambiguity, decide rather than escalate, and can carry difficult separation work repeatedly, humanely, and compliantly.
Systems: Rippling (HRIS and payroll), with acquired companies migrated as practical. Benefits broker, ATS, and equity administrator in place.
Travel: Some travel to acquired-company sites around diligence, close, and integration.
Support: Outside consultants, brokers, and employment counsel to lean on near term; internal support headcount possible as the company scales.
Team: No direct reports at start; opportunity to build a team as headcount grows.
Time zone: Pacific, with acquired employees across multiple time zones. Some schedule flexibility around payroll and integration events.
Background check: Required, given the healthcare and PHI environment.
Base salary: $150,000 – $175,000, set to level and experience
Bonus: 10% target
Target cash: approximately $165,000 – $192,500
Equity: Yes — participation in the company equity program
Benefits: Medical and dental with employer-paid coverage, 401(k), and PTO
Interested, or want to learn more before deciding? Reach out to AccelerateHC and we will share the company name and full details under confidence.
Our client is an equal opportunity employer. All qualified applicants will receive consideration without regard to race, color, religion, sex, sexual orientation, gender identity, national origin, disability, protected veteran status, or any other characteristic protected by law.
The posted salary range reflects the base compensation for this role. Actual compensation will depend on experience, qualifications, and level.
September 3, 2026