GiveDirectly has delivered more than $1B in cash directly to 2 million people living in poverty across 15 countries since 2011. We believe cash transfers are one of the most scalable, cost-effective, and dignified forms of aid, with the research to back it up. Our work has been covered by The Economist, NPR, TED, and The Washington Post. We are one of Time100’s Most Influential Companies of 2026. 

Our culture is candid, analytical, and non-hierarchical. We support high ownership and real professional growth. Curious about what it's really like to work here? Read our values and hear from the people who do. If they resonate, this could be a great fit!

About this role

GiveDirectly has delivered more than $1B in cash directly to 2 million people living in poverty and crisis around the world since 2011, establishing cash transfers are one of the most scalable, cost-effective, and dignified forms of aid. We are one of Time100’s Most Influential Companies of 2026, and our work has been covered by The Economist, NPR, TED, and The Washington Post. 

We're scaling significantly and building the People function to carry it, including evolving  the recruitment function needed to drive that growth. Today we're a team of eight, primarily based in Nairobi, and we're adding a recruiter to own our most senior and niche searches across every function: programs, tech, product, G&A, and fundraising.

The core of the job is proactive sourcing in markets where the talent is real but not obvious. You will not wait for inbound. You'll map the market, build calibrated pipelines from scratch, and get strong candidates into process quickly. Building GiveDirectly's name with institutions and networks across the continent is part of the work.

This is a generalist role for someone who has recruited senior talent on the continent across a range of functions. Our most acute needs right now are programs leadership and tech, so that's where you'll start, but the desk isn't single-function: you'll pick up our hardest searches wherever they sit. 

What you'll do

Own our hardest senior searches end to end

• Own Senior Manager searches from launch through offer at a 6 to 8 week pace where the market allows, starting with programs leadership and tech and extending to our toughest searches across other functions.
• Serve as the recruitment focal point for these roles: the person hiring managers come to, and the person who knows where this talent is.
• Build and maintain regional talent pipelines and GiveDirectly's presence with strong institutions and networks across the continent.

Source proactively

• Lead with outbound. Map talent pools, build boolean searches, and use LinkedIn Recruiter and our other tools to build small, strong, calibrated pipelines  rather than working through inbound volume.
• Translate a vague profile into a real search in a thin market, and recommend profile or approach changes when the market tells you something.
• Build diverse slates as a matter of course rather than treating it as an afterthought.

Drive the process and partner with senior hiring managers

• Run recruiter-led searches with senior hiring managers (up to c-suite): you drive, they don't. Lead launch calls and syncs, hold the timeline, challenge assumptions and hold lines on process quality when a search stalls.
• Run clean pipelines: keep Greenhouse current, review your funnels regularly to catch where candidates are stalling, and use pipeline data to diagnose a stuck search and to push hiring managers on decisions rather than letting roles drift.
• Own the candidate experience end to end: keep people warm and moving, sell GiveDirectly, run comp and logistics, and close the offer.

Contribute to the team

• Peer-coach more junior recruiters on sourcing and search craft, and turn what you learn into shared practice.
• Raise the bar for how our team recruits: build and roll out a consistent search process and outbound sourcing practice, model it in your own searches, and play a key role in coaching the team to adopt it - all while delivering an excellent candidate and hiring manager experience.
• If you bring French and/or Portuguese, put it to work on searches the rest of the team can't reach today.
• Feed what you're seeing in the market back to the Director, TA to sharpen overall strategy and take on select TA projects that improve how we hire.

What you'll bring

Required

• 5 years of relevant experience recruiting for tech-forward INGOs, or in a mission-driven scale-up or startup. Traditional NGO experience alone isn't enough; we want someone who has hired in a fast-moving, tech-literate environment.
• Deep proactive-sourcing experience for senior roles: you've built pipelines from scratch through outbound, in markets where the talent isn't obv