Founding HR Manager (HRBP Mentality)

Do you get energy from building the foundation, not just standing on one someone else poured? Do you love being the person leadership turns to when a people decision gets hard, not just the one who processes it after the fact? Do you want to build an entire people function from the ground up rather than inherit someone else's playbook? Are you motivated by shaping the culture of a company early enough that your fingerprints are still on it at 100 people?

With most HR Manager roles, you walk into a structure that already exists. Processes are set, culture is defined, policies are written. You maintain it. You might improve it. That's fine. But this is different.

You would be the first. Every hire, every process, every culture decision — you put that in place alongside your direct line: the CEO. When Sendent is at 50+ people, you'll be able to look at it and say: I built the foundation for this. I managed the process from A to Z.

That kind of opportunity is genuinely hard to find. Companies that need an HR Manager at your level already have one in place — or a Head of HR above them. We don't — yet. We're not looking for someone to run HR operations in isolation. We're looking for an HR Manager who thinks like an HRBP by default: someone who sees a policy gap and also sees the org-design question behind it, who runs a hiring process and also asks whether the role is even the right one to be hiring for.

This is a genuinely broad role. There's no team beneath you to hand pieces off to, and no HR function above you to lean on. Whatever needs to exist — you design it, build it, and execute on it yourself. That spans strategic people planning, hands-on recruitment, policy and contract work, culture, and compliance, all at once. If you're someone who wants a narrow, well-defined lane, this isn't it.

About Sendent
Sendent is a fast-growing software company focused on privacy-first enterprise collaboration and communication.

Our mission is to empower teams to secure their workflow effortlessly. We do so by building secure, user-friendly integrations between Microsoft tools and Nextcloud, enabling organizations to keep working with familiar software while retaining full control over their data.

We believe in sustainable software, ownership, and trust; both in our products and in how we work together.

You'll join a growing, international team, working closely with experienced engineers and the founders in an environment where quality, autonomy, and learning are valued over speed for speed's sake.

What You'll Do

HR Business Partnering

• Sit close to the CEO and leadership team as the person who translates business goals into people decisions
• Define company culture and help it take root across the team
• Design how Sendent hires, retains, and develops people as it scales
• Advise on people decisions that shape the company's future — not just execute them
• Plan for how the company operates and can grow sustainably at 25, 50, and 100 people — not just today

HR Management — Building and Executing

• Build onboarding, policies, and HR foundations from scratch — and run them day-to-day once they exist
• Own recruitment end-to-end: job descriptions, interviewing, offers
• Manage Dutch employment contracts, payroll basics, and compliance — flagging issues before they become problems
• Stay close to the detail — see your decisions play out, not just hand them off

Delegated Operational

• Direct an admin allrounder who supports you on operational tasks
• Keep your own time focused on the management and strategic judgment calls only you can make

What We're Looking For

• Solid experience as an HR Manager or senior HR Generalist, with real HRBP instincts and exposure — you naturally connect a day-to-day HR task to the bigger business question behind it
• Comfortable owning a genuinely broad remit — from strategic people planning down to drafting a contract template — without needing it narrowed or divided up
• Experience running recruitment end-to-end: writing job descriptions, screening, interviewing, and closing offers
• Comfortable building processes, policies, and structure where none exist yet, rather than optimizing something already in place
• Confident advising a CEO or senior leadership directly — this role has a direct line to the top, with no HR layer in between
• Relevant HR work experience in the Netherlands, with a solid working knowledge of Dutch labour law — you don't need to be a lawyer, but you know enough to flag "this is probably how it works, let's confirm with legal counsel" before an issue becomes a problem. You should be able to advise the founders on employee-law matters with more depth than just the basics
• B2 (or higher) level Dutch, spoken and written working fluency
• Comfortable managing and delegating to a supporting admin resource
• Energized by early-stage, fast-growing environments

This Role Probably Isn't for You If...

• You want a playbook, a team, or a Head of HR to report into — here, you are that layer
• You want a role with a tightly scoped lane — this one spans strategy, execution, and admin, all owned by you
• You see yourself as purely operational HR, without an interest in the business strategy behind it
• You'd rather optimize an existing process than build one from a blank page
• You're not comfortable being the one to tell the CEO "this isn't compliant, let's fix it" — directly, without a buffer
• You don't have hands-on HR experience in the Netherlands, or you're not at least at working fluency (B2) in Dutch
• You need a lot of structure or precedent before you can move — most days, there won't be any

What You'll Get

• €4,500–€5,500/month depending on experience
• Hybrid setup, with an in-office days 2-3 a week, in an office right across from Eindhoven Central station, with strong autonomy and real ownership
• 8% holiday allowance, 25 vacation days plus public holidays
• Pension
• Company laptop of your choice and company phone
• Home-office and internet allowance
• NS business card or full public transport reimbursement (or the legal km rate if you drive)
• Hybrid setup with real autonomy over your time and output
• A genuinely rare opportunity: sole ownership of the people function from the ground up

Ready to Apply?

If this sounds like your kind of work and you get energy from keeping things running smoothly — we'd love to hear from you.

Due to the hybrid nature of this role, applicants must be based in the Netherlands and have a valid work permit.

Acquisition, mid-lance, or offshore constructions are not appreciated.