Talent Acquisition Lead (GTM)
£60k - £90k GBP
About Kernel
Kernel provides enterprise RevOps teams with agentic company data for their CRMs.
We’ve raised a $14M Series A from top VCs and operators at Plaid, OpenAI, Slack and others to build the AI-native alternative to Dun & Bradstreet’s entity and hierarchy data.
RevOps teams at companies like Navan, Gong, Mistral, and AlphaSense use Kernel to build and maintain confidence in their CRM company data, eliminating duplicates and broken hierarchies without inhumane levels of manual review. The result is territories that can be defended, credibility with sales and leadership, and AI initiatives that actually work because the underlying company data is trustworthy.
Our data management platform combines entity-level intelligence with mass-action tooling to give RevOps teams the data quality and control needed to plan confidently and deploy AI successfully.
The Role
We're looking for a GTM-focused Talent Acquisition Lead to help us scale our commercial organization across Sales, Customer Success, Marketing, and Revenue Operations. Your north star will be building the team that takes Kernel $100M+ ARR.
You will own end-to-end recruiting for all GTM roles and act as a strategic partner to the CEO and leadership team. As we don't yet have a Head of Sales in place, you'll need to bring deep GTM expertise and the ability to consult on what "great" looks like at each level.
What You'll Be Doing
Full-Cycle GTM Recruiting: Own the entire hiring lifecycle for all commercial roles — AEs, SDRs, CSMs, AMs and Marketing — acting as a trusted advisor to the business, not just a resume screener.
Strategic GTM Partnership: Work closely with the CEO and leadership to define role requirements, calibrate seniority, and build hiring plans. You'll bring consultative expertise to help us make the right calls on talent, especially as we scale our GTM leadership team.
Sourcing Strategy: Move beyond inbound applicants. Hunt for high-quality candidates using creative sourcing strategies, including poaching talent from competitors, adjacent markets and passive networks.
Process Excellence: Build a data-driven hiring machine (scorecards, interview training, pipeline velocity, offer acceptance rates) that ensures a high bar for talent and an exceptional candidate experience.
Employer Brand: Act as the face of Kernel in the GTM market, helping us articulate our commercial ambition, product velocity, and customer obsession to attract A+ sales and CS talent.
What You Bring
3–7 years of experience: You have a track record in fast-paced environments (agency or in-house), ideally within high-growth B2B SaaS or data/infrastructure companies.
GTM Fluency: You speak "Sales and CS." You know the difference between transactional and consultative selling, understand how to assess quota attainment, and can calibrate seniority across IC and leadership roles. You've hired AEs, SDRs, CSMs, and ideally GTM leadership before.
Sourcing Mastery: You're expert at using modern tools (LinkedIn Recruiter, Ashby, Metaview) to find candidates who aren't actively looking. You know how to map competitive landscapes and build passive pipelines.
Operational Mindset: You don't just "do" recruiting; you build systems. You care about funnel conversion, time-to-hire, offer acceptance rates, and channel effectiveness.
Expertise: You bring expertise on market benchmarks, role design, and what "great" looks like at each level.
Ambition: You want to build a world-class GTM talent function from scratch and raise the bar with every hire.
Nice to Have
Experience in a startup environment (Series A-C stage)
Track record of recruiting for high-growth B2B SaaS GTM teams
Track record of hiring GTM leadership (VPs, Heads of)
⚠️ This role may not be for you if you:
Need lots of structure or a large team to delegate sourcing to
Prefer large-company environments with slow hiring cycles
Don't enjoy the "hunt" of outbound sourcing
❌ This role is definitely not for you if you:
Prefer remote work (requires 4+ days a week in London office)
Don't enjoy the pace of early-stage startups
Have side projects or want to manage a team immediately instead of building
What We Offer
We will do our best to offer you a ride of a lifetime. It will not be easy, but it will be thrilling.
💰 Salary: £60,000 – £90,000 + equity
🗓️ 24 days holiday per year + bank holidays
✈️ 2 weeks work-from-anywhere
💼 Pension plan
💻 Top-spec equipment and central London office
🍽️ Free dinner at the office
🎉 Team events and dinners
🚀 Work directly with the founders to scale the systems that power enterprise AI
🎫 Visas & Relocation
We generally require candidates to have the right to work in the UK. However, for exceptional candidates, we may offer visa sponsorship.
Interview Process
Stage 1 – Intro Call with Arvin (Head of Finance and Operations). Overview of Kernel, your recruitment philosophy, and operational fit.
Stage 2 – Case-Based Interview: A deep dive into your sourcing strategy, focused on how you would tackle a specific GTM role at Kernel (e.g., Enterprise AE or Head of Customer Success).
Stage 3 – Calibration with Zak (Sales Development). Assessing your ability to partner with commercial teams and screen GTM profiles.
Final Stage – Founder Interview with Anders (CEO) and Marcus to assess cultural fit and values alignment.
If there is mutual fit, we move to references and offer.