People Operations Manager

**About Us:** Salt \& Stone is skincare and self\-care for a life lived in motion. Founded in Los Angeles, Salt \& Stone is built on and from a connection to the natural world. We combine active ingredients from the sea and mountains with skin science and intoxicating fragrances, for a sensorial experience that soothes and restores. At Salt \& Stone, we are driven by a shared commitment to excellence and innovation. Our cultural values— **WINNING ATTITUDE, THOUGHTFUL URGENCY, OWNERSHIP MENTALITY, CHALLENGER APPROACH** —define who we are and how we work. We are dedicated to delivering exceptional products and experiences, operating with a sense of thoughtful urgency to ensure impactful progress while maintaining integrity in our decisions. Our competitive spirit fuels our ambition to be the best in our field, and we cultivate a culture where creativity thrives, valuing diverse perspectives and innovative thinking. We empower every team member to take ownership of their roles, fostering collaboration and trust throughout our organization. With a focus on excellence tempered by humility, we create an engaging and high\-performing environment where everyone is encouraged to express themselves. Join us in our mission to be trailblazers in our industry, and help us make a meaningful impact together. **Position Overview:** Salt \& Stone is looking to add a **People Operations Manager** to own and evolve the operational backbone of our People function. This is a high\-impact, visible role responsible for leading people programs, driving process excellence, and serving as a trusted HR partner to managers and employees across the organization. Reporting to our Sr. Director of People and working in close partnership to shape People strategy as the company scales, the People Operations Manager will own the employee lifecycle end\-to\-end, lead compliance and HR operations, and help shape the people infrastructure that enables Salt \& Stone to scale. The ideal candidate brings both operational depth and strategic instincts—someone who can run a tight HR function while also thinking about what we should build next and why. **Duties \& Responsibilities** **HR Operations \& Compliance** * Own the integrity of all employee data across our HRIS, ensuring accuracy, consistency, and audit\-readiness at all times. * Lead benefits administration—including plan management, open enrollment, broker partnerships, and employee escalations—ensuring a seamless and informed experience for all employees. * Oversee compliance across all HR processes, including I\-9 management, state registrations, EEO reporting, and required policy acknowledgments; proactively identify and remediate gaps. * Own the employee handbook and HR policy library, ensuring policies are current, legally compliant, and aligned with our culture and values. * Partner with Finance to lead payroll accuracy—owning the submission of all employee changes, auditing for errors, and managing off\-cycle adjustments. * Build and maintain a suite of HR reports and dashboards that give leadership real\-time visibility into headcount, attrition, comp, and engagement trends. * Serve as a first point of escalation for complex employee questions and issues, partnering with legal and leadership as appropriate. **Strategic HR Partnership** * Act as a trusted partner to managers and team leads on employee relations matters, performance concerns, and workforce decisions—balancing business outcomes with employee experience. * Support compensation planning cycles including annual reviews, offer benchmarking, and equity refresh processes, providing data\-driven recommendations to leadership. * Partner with the Sr. Director of People on workforce planning, org design discussions, and headcount modeling as the company scales. * Translate employee feedback and engagement data into actionable recommendations for leadership. * Advise managers on how to navigate sensitive conversations, handle performance concerns, and build high\-functioning, engaged teams. **Recruiting \& Hiring** * Partner with recruiters and hiring managers to ensure a seamless candidate experience and operationally tight hiring process across all active requisitions. * Drive improvements to the recruiting workflow, documentation, and tooling to reduce friction and improve speed\-to\-hire. **Onboarding \& Employee Lifecycle** * Own the new hire onboarding program end\-to\-end—from preboarding logistics to 30/60/90 touchpoints—ensuring every employee feels set up for success from day one. * Lead offboarding processes including exit conversations, documentation, system deactivation, and final pay coordination; synthesize offboarding feedback into actionable insights. * Drive the administration and continuous improvement of recurring HR cycles including performance reviews, compensation planning, and engagement surveys. * Identify and lead process automation and efficiency initiatives across the People function to reduce manual work and improve the employee experience at scale. **Employee Experience \& Culture** * Champion a cohesive, values\-aligned employee experience at every touchpoint—from the first email to the exit interview. * Lead the design and execution of employee recognition programs, milestone moments, and culture\-building initiatives throughout the year. * Partner on all\-hands logistics, team events, and internal communications to ensure the Salt \& Stone culture is felt across a distributed team. * Serve as a culture ambassador—actively listening to the employee experience, surfacing trends, and advocating for what employees need to do their best work. **Requirements** * 5\+ years of progressive experience in People Operations, HR Generalist, or HRBP roles, with demonstrated ownership of programs and processes. * Track record of partnering directly with managers and leaders on employee relations, performance, and people decisions, not just HR administration. * Strong command of HR compliance, employment law basics, and multi\-state regulatory requirements. * Proficiency with HRIS platforms (Rippling strongly preferred) and comfort building reports and dashboards from HR data. * Exceptional communication skills—you can write a clear policy, deliver difficult feedback, and present data to a leadership team. * High EQ and sound judgment—you know when to escalate, when to advise, and when to just solve the problem. * Proactive, self\-starter mindset, and comfortable operating with ambiguity in a fast\-growing, remote\-first environment. * Genuine passion for building people programs that actually make a difference for employees. * Comfortable in a fast\-paced, remote environment where priorities can shift and no two days look the same. * Exceptional communication and collaboration skills with the ability to influence across departments and seniority levels. * Excellent time management skills with a proven ability to meet deadlines * You are comfortable using data to tell a story and can speak confidently to the metrics of your role. **What Success Looks Like** * The People function is a trusted, high\-performing partner—not a blocker or bottleneck. * Managers feel equipped and supported to lead their teams through growth, change, and hard conversations. * Employees get fast, clear, and empathetic support at every stage of their experience. * HR operations run with precision: compliant, consistent, and scalable. * You bring structure and process without slowing the company down—and you leave things better than you found them. **Compensation \& Benefits** * Base Annual Salary: $125,000 \+ Bonus * Annual Performance Bonus * Medical, Vision, and Dental Insurance * Flexible Spending Account * 401(k) * Unlimited PTO * Paid Leave * Company Discounts