Recruitment Lead

This position is listed on behalf of a partner company, who manages all applications and next steps. Our partner is looking for a Recruitment Lead based in South Africa.

Take ownership of recruitment excellence in a fully remote, international talent acquisition environment. As Recruitment Lead, you will guide a team of Recruitment Specialists, ensuring consistently high standards across candidate assessments, client communication, and hiring outcomes. Working directly with the founders, you will oversee recruitment pipelines, coach team members, and help resolve complex searches while managing selected roles yourself. You will use performance metrics to identify gaps, improve team productivity, and ensure candidates meet client expectations. This role combines hands-on recruiting with people leadership, operational oversight, and process improvement. It offers an opportunity to shape recruitment practices, strengthen client partnerships, and grow into a Recruitment Manager position as the team expands.

Lead the recruitment team and take responsibility for the quality, consistency, and performance of its hiring activities. Maintain oversight of active searches, provide actionable coaching, and ensure clients receive timely updates and qualified candidates throughout the recruitment process.

• Review and approve every candidate scorecard before submission to clients, maintaining consistent evaluation standards.

• Observe screening interviews conducted by Recruitment Specialists, assess interviewing techniques, and provide targeted coaching to improve candidate evaluation.

• Attend client interviews, share recordings and detailed notes with the relevant specialist, and translate observations into actionable feedback.

• Manage the weekly team performance scoreboard, tracking sourcing activity, interviews, scorecard deadlines, and successful placements for each specialist.

• Monitor all active recruitment pipelines, identify delays or bottlenecks, and intervene early to keep searches progressing.

• Provide clients with written updates at least weekly on all open positions, including full-service and recruitment-only engagements, through to offer acceptance.

• Coordinate the handover to the People Lead once an offer is signed and identify additional hiring opportunities with existing clients.

• Manage one or two recruitment searches independently from sourcing through to offer acceptance.

• Allocate new searches across the team based on recruiter capacity, experience, and role requirements once fully familiar with the recruitment process.

• Train new recruiters, maintain and improve standard operating procedures, and collaborate with the founders to refine workflows.

• Identify performance concerns early, communicate expectations clearly, and recommend appropriate action when standards are not met.

• Monitor key performance indicators, including 90-day employee retention, candidate submission timelines, interview follow-ups, client communication, and continuous team improvement.

• Follow a structured 30/60/90-day onboarding plan, progressing from learning and shadowing to scorecard quality assurance, performance reporting, client updates, and full team ownership.

Requirements:

The ideal candidate combines strong full-cycle recruitment expertise with excellent candidate assessment, communication, and organizational skills. You should be comfortable working with international clients, coaching recruiters, managing several searches simultaneously, and taking accountability for measurable team outcomes. Candidates with previous leadership experience and senior recruiters ready to step into a leadership role are both encouraged to apply.

• At least 3 years of full-cycle recruitment experience in an agency or high-growth environment.

• Previous experience leading, coaching, or mentoring recruiters is a strong advantage, although experienced senior recruiters ready to progress into leadership are also welcome.

• Strong interviewing and candidate assessment skills, with the ability to distinguish genuine qualifications from rehearsed responses and clearly explain evaluation decisions.

• Ability to deliver direct, constructive, and specific feedback that improves individual and team performance.

• Excellent client-facing communication skills, including clear written updates, confident communication during calls, and transparency when recruitment timelines are at risk.

• Demonstrated experience recruiting across diverse functions, such as marketing, sales, creative, and operations.

• Excellent organizational and time-management skills, with the ability to manage multiple recruitment pipelines, deadlines, and documentation simultaneously.

• Familiarity with recruitment and collaboration tools, including BambooHR, LinkedIn Recruiter Lite, ClickUp, Slack, Google Workspace, Calendly, Fireflies, and Claude.

• Experience recruiting for agencies, e-commerce brands, or B2B services companies is an advantage.

• Experience supporting remote-first or geographically distributed teams is a plus.

• Strong ownership, accountability, sound judgment, and the ability to work independently in a remote environment.

• Availability to work Monday through Friday, from 5:00 PM to 2:00 AM Pakistan Standard Time (PKT).

Benefits:

• Competitive base salary aligned with experience.

• Commission on recruitment placements personally closed.

• Quarterly team performance bonus.

• Direct collaboration with company founders and meaningful ownership of recruitment operations.

• Autonomy to lead the team, improve workflows, and shape recruitment standards.

• Exposure to international clients, diverse industries, and a broad range of recruitment assignments.

• Career progression opportunity toward a Recruitment Manager position as the team grows.

• Fully remote working arrangement.

• Full-time contractor engagement within an internal recruitment team.