People Lead

About Us Every business needs to know who they’re really working with whether it’s suppliers, investors, partners, or third parties. At Xapien, we’re reinventing how organisations do that, combining speed, scale and accuracy with cutting-edge AI. Since 2018, we’ve grown from a deep-tech startup to a global player in AI-driven due diligence and risk intelligence. 2024 was a landmark year as we closed a $10M Series A, earned recognition in the Chartis RiskTech100® and Everest Group’s Leading 50™, and expanded our products, markets and customer base. 2025 was even bigger: With new regulations, rising compliance pressure and growing reputation risks, organisations everywhere are demanding smarter, faster ways to work and they’re turning to us. Customers worldwide from global law firms and private banks to universities and nonprofits rely on Xapien to turn days of manual research into trusted insights, delivered in minutes. Our momentum so far Customers in a diverse range of industries, with particular growth in wealth management, financial services and supply chain onboarding. Demand accelerating beyond our UK headquarters, across multiple continents with new customers in the Middle East, Asia, and Oceania. Why this is an exciting time to join This isn’t just another job role; it’s an opportunity to shape the future of the due diligence industry with a market-leading product trusted by global organisations. Whether you’re in marketing, communications, sales, or finance, you’ll play a critical role in driving growth, building credibility, and defining how we connect our product to a rapidly evolving market. We’re scaling fast with more customers, more releases, and bigger regulatory and market challenges. Expectations are rising, due diligence now means real-time insight, delivered efficiently and with impact. You won’t just be executing campaigns, closing deals, or managing numbers, you’ll be influencing strategy, optimising processes, and helping position a brand that’s setting the new standard for trust and transparency. For people who love learning, innovating, and making an impact that matters now is the moment to be a part of Xapien. The challenge Xapien is growing fast – from around 75 people today towards 100 in the coming year, including our first expansion into the US. Until now we’ve hired and led teams in a highly founder-led, manager-driven way, and that has served us well. At this scale, though, the risk is growing inconsistency in how we hire, manage, develop, and reward people – and we can already see early signals in engagement and retention, particularly in the 6–12 month window. The challenge in this role is to put the systems and frameworks in place that let us scale that quality, consistency, and fairness as we grow – without adding unnecessary bureaucracy. The role As Xapien scales, our ability to hire, develop, reward, and retain high-performing people depends on having strong systems behind our managers — not on any one person owning people decisions for them. The People & Talent Lead exists to design and implement those core systems. This is a builder's role: you'll create the practical frameworks, tools, and processes that give managers the structure and confidence to lead their teams well. You will not own people decisions on behalf of managers or leadership; you will make those decisions easier, fairer, and more consistent to make. You’ll report to the leader responsible for People and Finance, with strategic sponsorship from the CEO. You’ll work closely with our Talent Partner, and draw on existing operations and admin support for coordination and delivery. How the role works This role sits within a clear operating model: The People & Talent Lead designs and implements the systems that managers and leaders use. Managers remain accountable for leading their teams and for the people decisions within them. Existing operational support provides administrative and coordination capacity. In short: you build the system, managers run their teams within it, and operations help deliver it. Key Responsibilities Manager enablement Build practical tools, templates, and guidance that help managers hire, develop, and lead effectively. Design manager training covering feedback, performance conversations, role clarity, and decision-making. Support managers as a coach and partner, while ensuring accountability stays with the manager. Talent & hiring systems Define and implement a structured, high-quality hiring system, including role definition, interview frameworks, scorecards, and assessment criteria. Establish a clear hiring bar and a consistent approach to evaluating candidates. Manage and develop the Talent Partner, who continues to run hiring processes end-to-end. Use hiring data and funnel insights to improve quality, speed, and consistency. Performance & progression Design lightweight performance and progression frameworks. Ensure roles have clear expectations, success measures, and progression paths. Build the process, tools, and guidance needed for consistent performance conversations and decisions. Support calibration and consistency across teams. Reward, benchmarking & fairness Support the development of a compensation philosophy and benchmarking approach. Build guidance for pay reviews, promotions, and reward decisions. Ensure pay, progression, and performance frameworks are applied fairly and consistently. Partner closely with Finance on affordability, planning, and trade-offs. Onboarding & early employee experience Design a consistent onboarding framework that helps new joiners become productive quickly. Define manager responsibilities across the first 30, 60, and 90 days. Improve the employee experience through the first 6–12 months, particularly around role clarity, expectations, and development. People communications & adoption Own the communication and rollout of people frameworks, processes, and initiatives. Ensure changes are clearly understood and adopted across teams. Partner with existing operations/admin support on coordination and delivery. System design & implementation Define how people and talent systems work end-to-end. Keep frameworks simple, practical, and scalable. Establish clear ownership for each people process so it is applied consistently across the organisation. Support Xapien's evolution towards an AI-enabled workforce, including defining the capabilities required and helping leaders adapt team structures. What success looks like Managers take greater ownership of hiring and performance decisions, with the tools and confidence to do so effectively. Hiring quality and consistency improve across teams. Performance, progression, and reward decisions become clearer, fairer, and more consistent. Employees have stronger role clarity, particularly in the 6–12-month tenure group. Onboarding becomes more structured and effective. People systems are simple, adopted, and scalable. Leadership has better visibility and data to support people decisions. What you’ll bring Experience building people systems in scaling companies, ideally through comparable periods of fast growth. Strength across performance, progression, hiring systems, and reward frameworks. A practical, hands-on approach – comfortable building from scratch rather than inheriting an established function. Strong judgement and a commercial mindset. The ability to influence managers and senior leaders through credibility rather than authority. Comfort with ambiguity, pace, and a deliberately low-process environment. A systems-minded outlook, balanced with a healthy dislike of bureaucracy. Here’s our promise to you: We are going to work with you - to build a rewarding and fulfilling career with the opportunities, challenges and resources you need to do you your best work. We succeed together- you will own a meaningful part of the business through our employee shares & equity programme. Private health insurance to keep you in tip-top condition. Life Insurance – let's hope nobody ever needs this! Unlimited holidays – yes, it really is uncapped – take the time you need, when you need it. Everyone is learning, developing and challenging themselves so we have a £1k professional development fund per year if you want to learn new skills, even new things outside of work. Most importantly of all, we will work with you, to help you realise your fullest potential, always.