Senior People & Culture Business Partner

In the time it takes you to read this job description, RapidSOS will have handled ~1,380 emergencies.

At RapidSOS, we are committed to using technology to build a safer, stronger future and working together to save lives. We’re in an exciting phase of growth, welcoming new members from across the globe to our mission-driven, ambitious, and inclusive team. Our work is founded on our values of trust and safety, pioneering, urgency

, and purpose over pride

, all of which support a company culture where people can innovate, collaborate, grow, and, above all, make an impact.

RapidSOS is the leading public safety AI company that unlocks mission-critical intelligence for emergency response. It harnesses artificial and human intelligence to fuse life-saving data from the world’s largest safety network, which includes over 700M+ connected devices and 200+ global technology companies. This intelligence is delivered to 23,000+ federal, state, and local agencies, serving one million first responders.

RapidSOS has supported over one billion emergencies in 16 countries, powering RapidSOS HARMONY, the first purpose-built AI for public safety, designed to save critical time by automatically detecting emergencies, unifying real-time data and video streams, and coordinating a faster, more effective response. Learn more at www.RapidSOS.com.

What this role is about

As our Senior People & Culture Business Partner, you will work closely with the leaders of our Business Units to build the teams, leadership capability, and organizational effectiveness needed to achieve their business goals.

This is a strategic, hands-on role requiring a deep understanding of the business, its priorities, and challenges. You will be a trusted advisor and constructive challenger, using your business understanding, people expertise, and sound judgment to influence decisions about how we organize, lead, develop, and support our people.

A key measure of success will be the capability of the leaders you support. You will help leaders confidently own their people responsibilities, make thoughtful decisions, and build high-performing teams through practical advice, coaching, and strong People & Culture frameworks.

The role reports to the VP, People & Culture and works closely with Talent Acquisition, People Operations & Total Rewards, Organizational Capability, Finance, and Legal. As RapidSOS becomes increasingly AI-native, you will also help rethink how we work, using AI and technology to simplify routine activities and create more capacity for meaningful business partnership.

What you will do

• Strategic Business Partnership
• Build trusted relationships with Business Unit leaders, developing a deep understanding of their strategies, business performance, priorities, and challenges.
• Translate business priorities into practical people and organizational plans, proactively identifying workforce, leadership, and capability needs.
• Act as a strategic advisor and constructive challenger, helping leaders navigate complex decisions and take accountability for outcomes.
• Use workforce data and business insights to identify risks, challenge assumptions, and recommend improvements to organizational effectiveness.
• Organization Design & Workforce Planning
• Translate EOS business plans and priorities into workforce and organizational requirements, identifying the talent, capabilities, and structures needed to deliver them.
• Partner with leaders on workforce planning and organization design, including future capacity, critical roles, capability gaps, accountabilities, decision rights, and spans of control.
• Guide role scoping, job leveling, job descriptions, and headcount requests in partnership with Talent Acquisition and People Operations & Total Rewards.
• Advise on compensation decisions, including offers, promotions, pay adjustments, and reviews, ensuring recommendations reflect performance, market data, internal equity, and established Total Rewards frameworks.
• Guide leaders through organizational change, ensuring people impacts are understood and transitions are managed effectively.
• Leadership, Performance & Talent
• Coach leaders to build high-performing teams, establish clear expectations, provide meaningful feedback, and confidently own their people responsibilities.
• Embed RapidSOS's Continuous Performance approach and support performance and talent processes, including calibration, succession planning, retention risks, and development priorities.
• Partner with Organizational Capability to embed RapidSOS's leadership frameworks and development programs across the Business Units, coaching leaders to apply them and identifying emerging capability needs.
• Partner with Business Unit leaders to strengthen RapidSOS's culture, embedding our values and expected leadership behaviors into everyday decisions and team practices.
• Help leaders understand engagement and cultural challenges, using feedback and insights to strengthen team effectiveness and the team member experience.
• Employee Relations & Case Management
• Lead US employee relations and case management, including conduct, performance, attendance, accommodations, grievances, and separations, ensuring matters are managed fairly, consistently, and in a timely manner.
• Conduct and oversee workplace investigations, ensuring appropriate processes, objective findings, thorough documentation, and well-reasoned recommendations.
• Advise and coach leaders through complex employment matters and difficult people decisions, balancing business needs, team member experience, consistency, and risk while maintaining clear leadership accountability.
• Assess employment risks and determine appropriate escalation, partnering with Legal on matters involving significant risk, legal interpretation, or broader organizational implications.
• Identify recurring employee relations issues and address underlying leadership, organizational, or framework gaps.
• People & Culture Effectiveness
• Bring the business perspective into the design and improvement of People & Culture frameworks, playbooks, programs, and workflows.
• Partner across People & Culture, Finance, and Legal to ensure people initiatives and decisions are practical, consistent, and aligned with business needs.
• Use AI, automation, and self-service tools to improve the quality and efficiency of People & Culture work, maintaining human judgment in complex and sensitive matters.

What we are looking for

We are looking for an experienced People & Culture Business Partner who combines strong business understanding with people expertise, sound judgment, and the confidence to influence senior leaders.

You will bring:

• Significant experience as a People & Culture or HR Business Partner, ideally supporting senior leaders in a scaling or fast-changing organization.
• Strong business acumen and the ability to translate business priorities into effective workforce, organizational, and people decisions.
• The credibility to influence and constructively challenge senior leaders, with a coaching approach that builds leadership capability and accountability.
• Experience in organization design, workforce planning, compensation, performance, talent, and organizational change.
• Strong US employee relations expertise, including investigations, performance management, accommodations, and separations, with working knowledge of multi-state employment requirements.
• Sound judgment, independence, and the ability to balance business needs, team member experience, consistency, and risk.
• Strong communication skills and confidence using workforce data to inform decisions and recommendations.
• Adaptability, curiosity, and practical AI fluency, with the ability to work effectively in a changing environment.
• Helpful, but not required: Experience in a scaling technology company or multi-Business Unit / matrix organization.
• Experience supporting restructures, integrations, or significant operating model change.
• SHRM-CP/SCP, PHR/SPHR, or equivalent professional certification.
• Working arrangements: This is a hybrid role based in New York City, with an expectation of working from our NYC office 2–3 days per week. No regular travel is required.

What we offer

The opportunity to contribute to a mission-driven company working to solve one of the world's most important public safety challenges.

Competitive salary, benefits, and equity participation.

A dynamic, collaborative, and flexible environment where you can make a meaningful impact alongside talented and committed colleagues.

If you're curious to learn more about RapidSOS, you can check out https://rapidsos.com/blog/

Starting pay for a successful applicant will depend on a variety of job-related factors, which may include experience, relevant skills, training, education, location, business needs, or market demands. The salary range for this role is $160,000 - $170,000. This role will also be eligible to receive equity options.

#LI-Onsite / #LI-Hybrid

RapidSOS is proud to be an equal opportunity workplace. We are committed to equal employment opportunity regardless of race, color, ancestry, religion, sex, national origin, sexual orientation, age, citizenship, marital status, disability, or Veteran status.

Interested in the role but you don’t meet 100% of the requirements? We’d love to hear from you! We encourage you to apply; we’d be excited to see if your unique skill set and experience could be a match.