Chainguard is the trusted source for open source. By delivering hardened, secure, and production-ready builds of all the open source software engineers and AI agents rely on, Chainguard helps organizations build faster, stay compliant, and eliminate risk.
Our customers include Fortune 500 enterprises and global industry leaders, including Anduril, Canva, Fortinet, Hewlett Packard Enterprise, OpenAI, Snap Inc., and Snowflake.
Chainguard is venture-backed by leading investors, including Amplify, IVP, Kleiner Perkins, Lightspeed Venture Partners, Mantis VC, Redpoint Ventures, Sequoia Capital, and Spark Capital.
Chainguard is the trusted source for open source. By delivering hardened, secure, and production-ready builds of all the open source software engineers and AI agents rely on, Chainguard helps organizations build faster, stay compliant, and eliminate risk.
Our customers include Fortune 500 enterprises and global industry leaders, including Anduril, Canva, Fortinet, Hewlett Packard Enterprise, OpenAI, Snap Inc., and Snowflake.
Chainguard is venture-backed by leading investors, including Amplify, IVP, Kleiner Perkins, Lightspeed Venture Partners, Mantis VC, Redpoint Ventures, Sequoia Capital, and Spark Capital.
The role, in a nutshell: We're looking for a Director of People Operations to help scale our HR operations function as Chainguard grows and expands internationally. This role will lead our People Operations team, and will own the core employee lifecycle processes — onboarding, offboarding, compliance training, and job changes — as well as our expansion into new countries.
We're currently opening entities in the UK and Canada, with Germany to follow, and expect to open several more countries next year. This role will be central to that effort, working cross-functionally with Finance and Legal to figure out how we operate compliantly, and how we pay and support people, in every country we enter.
What You'll Do:
- Own and scale Chainguard's core employee lifecycle processes, including onboarding, offboarding, compliance training, and updates for promotions and job changes
- Lead the People Operations team, currently one manager with two direct reports
- Make HR Operations more visible and accessible to employees
- Lead the operational work of opening new legal entities internationally, including the UK, Canada, and Germany, and additional countries planned for next year
- Own the ongoing maintenance of HR operations and compliance across all countries where Chainguard operates
- Partner cross-functionally with Finance and Legal to navigate the compliance, payroll, and legal constraints of operating in each new country
- Manage and expand our partnership with our Employer of Record (EOR) provider, given our reliance on remote employees across roughly 19 countries
- Build scalable People Operations processes, templates, and resources as the function and company grow
- Bring strong AI fluency to the function, using AI to design smarter, more efficient People Operations processes and improve the employee experience.
What We're Looking For:
- 8–10+ years in HR/People Operations, including 3+ years in a leadership/management capacity
- Proven ownership of HRIS strategy — has led an implementation, migration, or major optimization (Workday, Rippling, ADP, or similar)
- Experience owning the full employee lifecycle: onboarding, offboarding, org changes, data integrity, and process design
- Background managing HR compliance operations — I-9s, leave administration, policy administration, audits
- Experience standing up or scaling a people ops function in a high-growth SaaS or startup environment
- International experience required, particularly across EMEA; experience in Japan, Singapore, or South America is a strong plus
- Direct experience opening new international entities and standing up HR compliance and operations in new countries
- Experience partnering with or managing an Employer of Record (EOR) for international employees
- A collaborative, solutions-oriented approach — this role needs to be a "yes, how can I help" partner to the business, not a bottleneck or blocker
- Strong track record managing and developing a team
- Comfort operating with some ambiguity and building process where it doesn't yet exist
Why This Role: Chainguard is in the middle of an ambitious international expansion, and our People Operations function needs to scale right alongside it. This role will be central to that work building the processes and infrastructure to support employees well, in every country we operate in, while also making HR Operations a more helpful, visible partner to the business day to day.
You'll have real ownership over how People Operations scales globally, with the opportunity to build and grow a team as the company continues to expand.
We live and breathe our company values:
- We are customer obsessed — We focus on delivering solutions to our customers that create value and make their lives better.
- We have a bias for intentional action — We prioritize, plan, try things, and fail fast.
- We don't take ourselves too seriously (but we do serious work) — We are solving an important problem which takes focus, but we also like to enjoy the journey.
- We trust each other and assume good intentions — We're transparent with decisions to empower team members to make well informed decisions.
A few of the benefits we offer:
- Flexible & Remote-First Culture: Work remotely with team meetup opportunities, bi-annual destination summits, and a monthly stipend for coworking spaces, phone and internet costs.
- Our Approach to Equity: Receive stock options upon hire and promotion. Plus, you can participate in secondary offerings and have 10 years to exercise your options (yes, you read that correctly: 10 years!).
- 100% Covered Health Insurance: We cover 100% of your health, vision and dental insurance premiums for you and your dependents. Nothing comes out of your paycheck.
- ∞ Flexible Time Off: Take the time you need – to do our best work, we need to recharge and reset.
- 18 Weeks Paid Parental Leave: We offer 18 weeks for birthing parents and 12 weeks for non-birthing parents, with the option to use it all at once or throughout your child's first year.
If your experience is close but doesn't fulfill all requirements, please apply. We're building the best team in technology and are focused on hiring "Chainguardians" with unique backgrounds, perspectives, and experiences.
Chainguard is an equal opportunity employer. We do not discriminate based upon race, religion, color, national origin, sex (including pregnancy, childbirth, reproductive health decisions, or related medical conditions), sexual orientation, gender identity, gender expression, age, status as a protected veteran, status as an individual with a disability, genetic information, political views or activity, or other applicable legally protected characteristics. We also consider qualified applicants with criminal histories, consistent with applicable federal, state and local law.
By submitting your application, you acknowledge that Chainguard will process your personal data in accordance with Chainguard's Global Candidate Privacy Notice.
©2026 Chainguard. All Rights Reserved.
Skills Required
- 8-10+ years of experience in HR or People Operations
- 3+ years in a leadership or management capacity
- Experience leading an HRIS implementation, migration, or major optimization using Workday, Rippling, ADP, or similar
- Experience owning the full employee lifecycle, including onboarding, offboarding, organizational changes, data integrity, and process design
- Experience managing HR compliance operations, including I-9s, leave administration, policy administration, and audits
- Experience building or scaling a People Operations function in a high-growth SaaS or startup environment
- International People Operations experience, particularly across EMEA
- Direct experience opening international entities and establishing HR compliance and operations in new countries
- Experience partnering with or managing an Employer of Record provider
- Strong collaborative and solutions-oriented approach
- Track record of managing and developing a team
- Comfort operating with ambiguity and building new processes
- Experience in Japan, Singapore, or South America
Chainguard Compensation & Benefits Highlights
The following summarizes recurring compensation and benefits themes identified from responses generated by popular LLMs to common candidate questions about Chainguard and has not been reviewed or approved by Chainguard.
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Affordable Benefits — Health insurance is fully employer-paid for employees and dependents, materially reducing out-of-pocket costs. Public benefits materials consistently highlight this as a cornerstone of the package.
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Parental & Family Support — Paid parental leave for all parents and meaningful family-planning support (including adoption, IVF, egg freezing, and surrogacy) are emphasized across company materials. These elements broaden support for different family paths and stages.
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Equity Value & Accessibility — Stock options are granted at hire and promotion with a long post-termination exercise window, improving flexibility and potential value capture. This structure is presented as notably employee-friendly for a startup.
Chainguard Insights
What We Do
Chainguard is the secure foundation for building with open source software. The company's portfolio of secure, minimal container images helps organizations embrace a new culture of software development where starting left with security, not shifting left, is the reality. Chainguard was founded by the industry's leading experts on software supply chain security, open source, software, and cloud-native development. We aren't a traditional security vendor. It's container images provide secure-by-default infrastructure that introduces zero friction to developer workflows. That's why developers love and CISOS trust Chainguard. Its customers include Fortune 500 enterprises and leading technology and security companies, including Anduril, Canva, Domino Data Lab, Checkmarx, HPE, GitLab, Snowflake, and Wiz. Chainguard is venture-backed by leading investors, including Amplify, IVP, Lightspeed Venture Partners, Redpoint Ventures, Sequoia, and Spark Capital.
Why Work With Us
Security is our mission, but having fun is our mantra. Since our founding, we've increased +1M memes, sung 900+ hours of Kubernetes-themed karaoke, and created 774+ whacky Slack emojis. Beyond this, Chainguard's innovation and leadership in open source and software supply chain security has been recognized by industry leaders.
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