Head of People

Hi, I'm Marloes, interim Head of People at FeedbackFruits. 👋

We are at a real turning point. We have spent the last quarter stabilising, and now we are deciding what kind of company we want to be as we grow. We recently ran a company-wide engagement survey, and it told us two things clearly. First, that we have something worth protecting and developing: talented, mission-driven people, managers who care, and trust inside the teams. Second, that we have foundations to rebuild. Clearer priorities and direction, fairer and more transparent reward and growth, stronger ways of working across teams, and leadership people can consistently trust.

We have already done the diagnosis and mapped where we are going. We have a People Vision and a roadmap ready to implement. What we need now is the Head of People who turns that plan into reality. Someone who holds the people voice with our leaders, and peers and keeps pulling the conversation up to what matters: what kind of employer we want to be, what our values mean day to day, and how we hold each other accountable to them. Someone who builds the foundations that let good people do their best work and actually want to stay.

This is not a polished, fully resourced function waiting for a figurehead. It is a foundations phase. You will be hands-on as much as strategic, building and fixing things that do not exist yet, often with a small team and a finite budget. It takes resilience, patience and a bit of bite. But the impact you can have in this role…

What you'll do:

• Deliver the People Vision and roadmap that are already in place, owning the execution end to end. The direction is set, so your job is to make it happen, with the space to shape how we get there and to bring your own thinking along the way.

• Be the voice of people in the leadership team. Keep bringing the conversation back to what kind of employer we want to be, what our values mean in practice, and how we hold each other accountable, including challenging the leadership team and founders when it serves the company.

• Lead our near-term stabilisation priorities: rebuilding the foundations around performance and expectations, supporting strategic clarity and execution discipline, and building a learning and development strategy.

• Own the full employee lifecycle, from how people join to how they grow, are rewarded and eventually leave, and simplify it. A lot of our processes are fragmented, over-engineered and siloed. Your job is to connect and lighten them so they scale.

• Build the things people are asking us for: clear performance expectations, career levelling and progression, and a transparent, fair pay and reward philosophy.

• Develop our managers and leaders through coaching, feedback and a clear capability framework, so people feel supported and stretched in equal measure.

• Tackle retention and engagement at the root, working out why good people disengage and doing something about it.

• Lead and grow a small People team across People Ops, Talent Acquisition, People & Culture Business Partner and Office Management, while leaning into the whole organisation.

• Own our people data and reporting, including a regular read for the leadership team and the talent metrics for our quarterly business reviews.

• Roll your sleeves up. With a lean team, you will sometimes design the strategy and sometimes be the one delivering it. Both are the job.

What you bring:

• Senior People experience in a scale-up, with a real understanding of what it takes to build something that scales rather than just adding more.

• Strategic and hands-on in equal measure. You can set direction and you can build and execute when something does not exist yet. This is not a place with a big team to do it for you.

• An independent thinker with real ownership. You look at all the pieces on the table and propose something better, rather than waiting to be told what to do. You reduce dependency, you do not create it.

• The courage to challenge, and a bit of bite. You can tell a founder / COO , with respect, that you disagree, and you can hold the line when a decision needs to be made and stuck to.

• Resilience and patience. This is a multi-quarter culture lift, with the curveballs that come with a scale-up. You have done some version of lifting the standard before, so you know it is not quick.

• A people person who leans into the whole organisation. You spend your time across the business.

• A solid understanding of Dutch labour law and the regulations that come with it.

• Strong written and spoken English. Dutch is a plus.

• Based in or around Amsterdam, with strong in-person presence.

What you get:

• A salary of €6.200 - €7.000, depending on experience

• 25 paid holidays per year

• Hybrid working, with 3 days a week from our Amsterdam office

• A day off for your birthday

• Advantageous pension scheme

• 3 days of volunteering leave per year

• €550 Learning & Development budget per year, plus 3 paid days for learning

• Travel allowance and a Swapfiets subscription

• Free access to the office gym

• Unlimited access to mental health support through OpenUp (within the EU, US and AUS)