Director, Global People Operations & AI

About the role

Ethos is building a People organization that scales through both talent and technology, and this role sets the direction for how we get there. As Director, Global People Operations & AI, you'll own how People services are delivered worldwide: the Global People Services team, the operating model that supports every employee, and the automation and enablement strategy for the entire People organization. You'll define and stand up a tiered service model that moves work fluidly from self-service, to shared services, to experts, and you'll set the vision for where AI agents and automation handle repeatable work so our people can focus on judgment, complexity, and experience. Reporting to the VP, Total Rewards & Operations, you'll lead a growing team, partner with HR Technology, IT, Legal, and People leaders across regions, and build the governance and controls that let us scale responsibly. This is a strategic, hands-on leadership role for someone who can design an operating model and then make it real.

Duties and Responsibilities:

• Own the strategy and multi-year roadmap for Global People Operations, defining how the People organization delivers services across all regions.
• Lead the Global People Services team, setting standards, service levels, quality, and coverage across geographies.
• Set the direction for automation and enablement across the global People organization, establishing an operating model where AI agents and automation carry repeatable work and people own judgment and experience.
• Design and implement a tiered service model spanning self-service (knowledge, portals, and AI assistants), shared services (People Ops handling routine and mid-complexity cases), and experts (centers of excellence and senior partners for complex work), with clear routing and escalation.
• Build the governance framework for AI and automation in People Ops: guardrails, human-in-the-loop controls, privacy, security, auditability, and compliance across jurisdictions.
• Define and own the metrics that measure success: service levels, case deflection, cycle time, cost-to-serve, accuracy, and employee experience, reporting outcomes to leadership and using them to prioritize investment.
• Lead and coach the People Operations team, including the People Product Managers, building capability in process design, agent oversight, and service delivery.
• Partner with HR Technology, IT, Legal, Finance, and People leaders to align global systems, data, and processes, and to advance operations through automation.
• Own change management and adoption for new processes, automations, and the tiered service model across regions and cultures.
• Ensure global compliance and data governance across the markets where Ethos operates.
• Manage vendors, budget, and the tooling roadmap for People Operations and shared services.
• Continuously scale and improve the operating model as Ethos grows and enters new markets.

Qualifications and Skills:

• 10+ years in People/HR Operations, shared services, or people/business operations, including several years leading teams.
• Proven experience building or running a People/HR shared services function and a tiered service model (self-service, shared services, experts).
• Track record setting automation and enablement strategy and deploying AI or agentic solutions in an operations context.
• Strong operating discipline: service-level management, metrics, cost-to-serve, and capacity planning.
• Experience operating globally across multiple countries, with a working knowledge of regional compliance and data-privacy requirements.
• Excellent leadership, stakeholder-management, and executive communication skills.
• Working understanding of AI governance: privacy, fairness, security, auditability, and human oversight designed-in from the start.
• Change-management expertise, with the ability to drive adoption at scale across a distributed organization.
• Sound judgment in handling sensitive, confidential, and high-stakes situations.
• Bachelor's degree required; relevant certifications preferred.

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The US national base salary range for this full-time position is $163,000 - $288,000. Our salary ranges are determined by role, level, and location. The range displayed on each job posting reflects the minimum and maximum target for new hire salaries for the position across all US locations. Within the range, individual pay is determined by work location and additional factors, including job-related skills, experience, and relevant education or training.

Please note that the compensation details listed in US role postings reflect the base salary only and do not include applicable bonus, equity, or benefits.

You can find further details of our US benefits at https://www.ethoslife.com/careers/