Principal Talent Acquisition Partner - Defence AI

Principal Talent Acquisition Partner - Munich

Who we are

Helsing is a defence AI company. Our mission is to protect our democracies. We aim to achieve technological leadership, so that open societies can continue to make sovereign decisions and control their ethical standards.

As democracies, we believe we have a special responsibility to be thoughtful about the development and deployment of powerful technologies like AI. We take this responsibility seriously. We are an ambitious and committed team of engineers, AI specialists and customer-facing programme managers.

We are looking for mission-driven people to join our European teams – and apply their skills to solve the most complex and impactful problems. We embrace an open and transparent culture that welcomes healthy debates on the use of technology in defence, its benefits, and its ethical implications.

The role

We are looking for a Principal Talent Acquisition Partner to lead the talent acquisition strategy and delivery for a set of business units across Commercial, Hardware, General & Admin and other non-software business units. This is a strategic partnership role where you will own the execution of hiring plans as well as acting as a direct extension of the Talent Acquisition leadership team. You will act as a mentor to the wider team, setting standards for business acumen, advisory and data fluency.

The day-to-day

• Own the end-to-end hiring delivery for a broad range of roles in your portfolio, serving as the primary strategic talent partner to executives.

• Partner with TA and People leadership to define and resource 6 to 12-month hiring roadmaps, ensuring alignment between business strategy and TA support model.

• Own and drive programmatic initiatives that solve systemic issues and broadly impact the efficiency and value creation of the Talent function, such as talent market intelligence and diversity.

• Drive targeted employer branding efforts to develop a long-tail pipeline of mission-driven talent and increase the quality of inbound candidates.

• Provide data-driven advisory on long-term talent topics, utilizing deep insights to influence leadership on hiring, representation, and retention.

• Optimise the TA tech stack by proactively adopting new tools and demonstrating a hands-on approach to responsible AI in talent acquisition.

You should apply if you

• Operate beyond delivery-focussed recruitment, acting as a strategic architect to deliver searches ranging from leadership to niche positions in region and global markets.

• Possess expert knowledge of the deep tech landscape, translating long-term business goals into actionable search strategies.

• Have extensive experience as a Principal Recruiter or Talent Acquisition Lead, collaborating directly with executive stakeholders to execute against hiring and workforce plans.

• Are proficient in leveraging modern TA tech stacks to drive ROI, optimize search efficiency, and ensure rigorous assessment standards.

• Take full ownership of programmatic initiatives that broadly impact the wider People and Talent Acquisition function, focusing on talent quality and long-term value creation.

HELSING - EXTERNAL COLLABORATION

Join Helsing and work with world-leading experts in their fields

• Helsing’s work is important. You’ll be directly contributing to the protection of democratic countries while balancing both ethical and geopolitical concerns.

• The work is unique. We operate in a domain that has highly unusual technical requirements and

constraints, and where robustness, safety, and ethical considerations are vital. You will face unique

Engineering and AI challenges that make a meaningful impact in the world.

• Our work frequently takes us right up to the state of the art in technical innovation, be it reinforcement learning, distributed systems, generative AI, or deployment infrastructure. The defence industry is entering the most exciting phase of the technological development curve. Advances in our field of world are not incremental: Helsing is part of, and often leading, historic leaps forward.

• In our domain, success is a matter of order-of-magnitude improvements and novel capabilities. This means we take bets, aim high, and focus on big opportunities. Despite being a relatively young company, Helsing has already been selected for multiple significant government contracts.

• We actively encourage healthy, proactive, and diverse debate internally about what we do and how we choose to do it. Teams and individual engineers are trusted (and encouraged) to practise responsible autonomy and critical thinking, and to focus on outcomes, not conformity. At Helsing you will have a say in how we (and you!) work, the opportunity to engage on what does and doesn’t work, and to take ownership of aspects of our culture that you care deeply about.

What we offer

• A focus on outcomes, not time-tracking

• Competitive compensation and stock options

• Relocation support

• Social and education allowances

• Regular company events and all-hands to bring together employees as one team across Europe