Staff Recruiter (R5549)

Shield AI is a venture-backed defense-tech company with the mission of protecting service members and civilians with intelligent systems. Its products include Hivemind autonomy software, V-BAT and X-BAT aircraft, and Aechelon simulation and synthetic reality technologies. With offices and facilities across the U.S., Europe, the Middle East, and Asia-Pacific, Shield AI’s technology actively supports operations worldwide. For more information, visit www.shield.ai. Follow Shield AI on LinkedIn, X, Instagram, and YouTube.

Job Description:

We’re hiring a Strategic Talent Acquisition Partner to help power our next phase of growth across EMEA. This is a high-impact, business-critical role at the heart of Shield’s AI international expansion—supporting new market entries, building and scaling best-in-class sales and engineering organisations, and partnering with senior leaders to shape our future. This is not a transactional recruiting role. You will operate as a strategic advisor, market expert, and builder—owning how talent enables scale across diverse EMEA markets.

What you'll do:

Strategic Talent Partnership

• Partner closely with senior and executive-level stakeholders to understand business objectives, growth plans, and capability gaps.

• Translate market entry and growth plan into scalable, data-driven regional talent acquisition strategies.

• Act as a thought partner and advisor on talent trends, market intelligence, and competitive hiring strategies.

• Advise leaders on market feasibility from a talent perspective (availability, cost, timing, and risk).

Execution with Excellence

• Own the end-to-end recruitment lifecycle for all roles including senior, critical, and hard-to-hire roles.

• Partner to design and execute sourcing strategies that attract high-impact engineering and commercial talent across the EMEA region

• Shape local hiring approaches while maintaining a consistent global hiring bar.

Employer Branding & Talent Attraction

• Act as an EMEA ambassador for our employer brand, ensuring we are positioned as an employer of choice in the region

• Partner with Branding, Comms, and Leadership to shape and localise our employer value proposition for different EMEA countries.

• Identify and activate employer branding opportunities (events, content, communities, referrals, social presence).

• Ensure inclusive, consistent, and authentic candidate experience that reinforces our brand and values at every touchpoint.

Driving at Scale

• Use data to forecast hiring needs, track progress, and continuously optimise our recruitment performance.

• Improve TA processes, tools, and ways of partnering to support speed, quality, and scale.

• Be a visible voice for talent across the EMEA leadership community.

Required qualifications:

• Proven experience as a strategic talent acquisition partner driving full cycle hiring for both engineering and go to market talent within the defence space or Public Sector Saas space.

• Demonstrated success supporting new market entries and scaling teams at pace.

• Strong credibility working with senior leaders and executives as a trusted talent advisor and business partner.

• Deep understanding of EMEA talent dynamics, sourcing strategies, and competitive intelligence.

• Highly consultative, commercially minded, and comfortable operating with ambiguity.

• Ability to balance strategic thinking with hands-on execution.