Senior People Enablement Partner
Orbital is the AI platform for real estate legal work.
Real estate shapes the world around us: our homes, our workplaces and our cultural landmarks. It’s the infrastructure that powers everyday life and is the world's largest asset class. Yet behind every single deal, real estate and legal teams work hard to navigate decades-old complexity; manually connecting documents, hidden obligations, geo-spatial context, and multiple parties into a path forward. We connect the legal and physical record, so that path is clearer than ever before. Our mission is to make real estate transactions faster, clearer, and less manual.
Here, you'll be part of changing how the deals behind the largest asset class get transacted, and will help shape the future of real estate.
A bit about us:
We’re building at the forefront of AI technology, without losing the deeply human expertise our clients depend on.
Orbital is built with former practising real estate lawyers and 250+ years of combined legal expertise. We're purpose-built for the complexity of real estate: accelerating due diligence, drafting and negotiation, and deal coordination with legal-grade precision.
We've just raised a $60m Series B, led by Brighton Park Capital, to accelerate our global expansion - $75m raised to date.
We're trusted by 5,000+ real estate professionals, spanning UK Magic Circle and US Am Law 100 firms, to household names like M&S. Leading firms like BCLP, Orrick, Goodwin, Womble Bond Dickinson and Clifford Chance rely on Orbital to remove the busywork, freeing legal and real estate teams to focus on sharp judgment, standout client service, and closing deals faster.
Working at Orbital means joining a bold, ambitious team, with the trust to take ownership and make a real impact from day one.
Orbital is scaling fast as we build the AI technologies powering the future of enterprise productivity. To support this growth, we're hiring an experienced and forward-thinking People Enablement Partner to design, drive, and deliver how we support and retain world-class talent at Orbital. This is a mid to senior role with both strategic and hands-on ownership to design People Products, influence direction, and shape how our managers and teams operate at scale.
The job, in a nutshell
You'll be one of the first hires in our US People function. You'll report initially to our People Director (based in London), and then to our New York-based VP of People once that role is in place later in our US expansion. As a foundational US People team hire, you'll have real influence over how this function (and your role within it) evolves. We're building a modern People team leaning into an 'Employee Experience as a Product' methodology: designing scalable solutions that support individual growth and business success, not just reactive fixes.
Our operating model is built on three main layers: Partner, Product and Platform.
Partner: The layer closest to the people leading teams. It works closely with them, understands the work they do, and helps them lead with confidence and consistency.
Product: The layer that shapes how the organisation works. It designs the frameworks and experiences people use, and improves them as the company grows.
Platform: The operating layer the whole function runs on. It keeps the systems and data underneath effective, integrated, automated and built to scale.
These aren't separate sub-teams or job titles; they describe the type of work involved, and act as a flywheel, each layer feeding the other two;
This role sits equally across Partner and Product layers. In practice, this means that you'll partner with managers to surface insights, then own the design and implementation of people solutions from start to finish. Your Partnering focus will primarily be our go-to-market teams, which are mostly US-based with some overlap into the UK. Product layer, on the other hand, is designed to work company-wide: you'll partner closely with our UK-based People Enablement Partner and People Director so what we build lands consistently across teams and regions.
What you'll do
Partner with managers across the business to diagnose team challenges, surfacing deep insights that will shape our People Product roadmap.
Enable managers to confidently handle performance, conduct, and team issues through effective coaching, guidance, and accessible resources.
Apply product management principles, such as user research, problem framing, roadmap prioritization, MVP testing and tracking outcomes, when designing new People processes.
Design and implement scalable People Products that support employees at all stages, create measurable business outcomes, and scale effectively with the business.
Own the People Product lifecycle end-to-end: from identifying the foundational problem and designing the solution, through to successful rollout and adoption.
Serve as a trusted advisor on US employment matters, including multi-state compliance, FMLA administration, leaves of absence, and day-to-day employee relations.
Identify patterns that signal where new solutions are needed and translate insights into clear, actionable recommendations.
Find ways to measure outcomes that highlight impact and identify where we still need to improve.
Iterate on what you build based on real-world feedback; nothing is set and forget.
What you might be working on
Our initial 2026 People team priorities give a flavor of the types of challenges you'll help tackle:
Manager capability: Equipping managers with frameworks and guidance to handle performance, conduct, and team issues at first line.
Performance enablement: Implementing clear expectations and feedback cycles that scale with team growth.
US People foundations: Helping build out the US-specific pieces of our People stack, from multi-state compliance to leave administration and benefits enablement.
And these are just the tip of the iceberg. There are still foundational layers to build and new challenges that you will play a central role in identifying and prioritizing.
Requirements
The must-haves
You have strong relevant experience in People Partnering, especially with Go-To-Market or Commercial teams, with good understanding of operational effectiveness.
You start from the challenge rather than the solution, and want to understand what is happening before defaulting to a fix.
You have a strong working knowledge of US federal and state employment laws (e.g. FLSA, Title VII, ADA, ADEA, EEO, wage and hour, worker classification).
Comfortable with at-will employment and managing separations across multiple states, or confident picking up new state requirements as we expand.
You have hands-on experience with FMLA administration and other leave of absence processes (e.g. state paid family leave programs, ADA accommodations, parental leave), including advising managers and supporting employees through the full leave lifecycle.
You enjoy working closely with managers as well as building scalable people initiatives and have the ability to transform insights into real business impact.
You have strong communication and relationship-building skills combined with good judgment and discretion when working with sensitive employee matters and issues.
You care deeply about employee experience and business impact, and want to find ways to combine these in a meaningful way.
You thrive in ambiguity where we don't always have all the answers and rewriting People Playbooks excites you.
You combine strategic thinking with a pragmatic, hands-on approach, operating comfortably across proactive projects while building foundational processes.
You embrace technology and AI, and actively look for ways they can help you and others work smarter.
You understand the nuances between urgent and important and how to prioritize accordingly.
And a few nice-to-haves
Experience in fast scaling tech/AI startups
Experience working with commercial teams, variable compensation/OTE structures
Experience supporting organizations operating across both the US and UK (or other international markets)
Exposure to UK employment law is a plus, given we operate across both markets, though you'll have a strong UK-based team to lean on for this.
Comfort with tools like Hibob and Justworks (or similar HRIS), Notion, Slack and the Google ecosystem
Why you'll love it here
You'll join a startup at an exciting inflection point ahead of a period of high-growth.
You'll enjoy rethinking how a People team delivers real value through new ways of working and evidence led design.
You'll have the opportunity to tackle meaningful challenges in a genuinely career-defining role.
You'll be part of a collaborative, highly ambitious and friendly culture where curiosity and innovation are celebrated.
Why this might not be for you
You are looking for a conventional HR role; this remit requires passion equal for partnering with managers as well as solving operational challenges, and leaning into opportunities enabled by AI and modern tooling.
You prefer steady rhythms or high predictability; we are building a new function with big bets and ambitious goals, and the work will stretch your thinking in a supported environment with space to learn and grow.
You want to follow fully defined processes or you feel uncomfortable with areas that are not yet structured; we are still shaping and rewriting People Playbooks and building foundations for a fast paced AI startup so you need to be comfortable with a level of ambiguity and work-in-progress.
Hiring process
This is our planned process for this role, though there may be slight variations where needed.
If you need any reasonable accommodations at any stage, please let us know!
Application review: We'll review your resume and application. Due to the high volume of applications, unfortunately, we're not able to provide individual feedback at this stage.
Screening video call (30 min): A conversation with one of our Talent Partners. They'll share more about Orbital and the role, hear about your background, and ask some questions about your experience. You'll have time to ask them questions too.
Hiring manager call (45 min): A conversation with Riikka (People Director, and your initial hiring manager for this role). We'll go into your experience in more depth, your approach to People Partnering and People Product work, and the kinds of challenges you'd tackle at Orbital. Plenty of time for your questions too.
Take-home task: If the hiring manager interview goes well, we'll send you a short, realistic scenario: this shouldn't take you more than an hour. We're interested in how you think, not the "right" answer or a full-fledged process. If you're successful, we'll invite you to the panel discussion. If not, we'll share feedback.
Panel discussion (90 min): You'll present your task and we'll dig into it together, followed by further questions about your experience. This would be an in-person interview in our New York office.
Culture interview (30 min): A conversation about values and how we work with some of our team members. A great opportunity for you to learn more about Orbital as well so bring your questions! We'll try to schedule this on the same day as your Panel discussion, but if that's not possible, we can do this remotely at another time too.
Offer!!
Benefits
Compensation: We offer a competitive starting salary in the range of $165,000-$165,000, depending on experience. We share salary ranges upfront to build trust, reduce bias, and support an inclusive process, even as we continue developing our internal pay structures.
We believe in flexibility, but we're also big on in-person collaboration. This role is based in our New York office two days a week, with additional time in as needed for things like all-hands, interviews, or team sessions. It's about being present when it matters, and balancing autonomy with impact.
401k match and equity options in a fast-growing start-up.
Comprehensive medical, dental, and vision coverage for you and your dependents.
Rest and Recharge: 20 days paid holiday (plus public holidays), so you can rest, recharge, and take care of what matters most to you.
Generous parental leave policy designed to support all parents and caregivers in balancing family and work life, in addition to any state-mandated paid family leave entitlements.
Professional equipment and personal development budget along with training opportunities to learn and develop your skills.
Pre-tax commuter benefits to help you get to and from the office.
We're in the process of building an inclusive, welcoming culture where everyone feels seen and valued. Expect regular team off-sites, shared lunches, and social events, with something for everyone.
Security is everyone’s responsibility at Orbital. We ask all team members to follow our security policies, complete regular awareness training, and handle sensitive data with care in line with ISO 27001 standards. Spot something unusual? Reporting risks or incidents quickly helps us maintain the strong culture of security and compliance we all depend on.
At Orbital, we’re committed to building a diverse and inclusive team. We especially welcome applications from people who are traditionally underrepresented in tech. Even if you don’t meet every single requirement, or if the right role isn’t listed yet, we’d still love to hear from you.
This hiring range is a reasonable estimate of the base pay range for this position at the time of posting. Pay is based on several factors, which may include job-related knowledge, skills, experience, and business requirements.
Everyone who works with Orbital goes through background screening before they start. It's part of how we keep Orbital secure, for the people who work here and for the client information we're trusted with.