Senior Talent Acquisition Partner, Digital Experience & Engineering

DEPT

DEPT® is a Growth Invention company built to help the world’s most ambitious brands grow faster. Operating at the intersection of technology and marketing, our 4,000+ specialists deliver growth invention services across Brand & Media, Experience, Commerce, CRM, and Technology & Data. We’re 50|50 tech and marketing, partner-led, and first to move. Clients include Google, Lufthansa, Meta, eBay, and OpenAI. We have been certified B Corp and Climate Neutral since 2021. JOB PURPOSE As a Senior Recruiter, you will play a pivotal role in shaping the future of our agency by developing and implementing strategic talent acquisition initiatives for our Experience & Engineering service teams across EMEA. Our Experience & Engineering teams develop technical solutions and create beautiful designs to deliver exceptional and engaging digital experiences for our clients. You will hire the talent that creates these digital experiences; think UX/UI Design, Strategist, Technical Project Manager, Account Managers. You will embody DEPT®'s culture as the initial ambassador for candidates, ensuring a seamless and positive experience throughout their recruitment journey. By collaborating closely with leadership teams, you will gain a deep understanding of role requirements, deliver regular updates on hiring progress, and offer valuable market insights and drive informed decision-making together with the leadership team. WHAT YOU’LL DO * Alongside the Head of TA, you will develop and implement the talent strategy for our Digital Experience services across key EMEA markets. You're shaping how we hire at the senior and strategic end, not just running the searches. * Operates as a trusted advisor to senior leadership, managing expectations, challenging the brief when the ask doesn't match reality, and turning "unicorn" requests into searchable, fillable mandates. * Use data to lead, not just report; turn hiring intelligence into the insight that shapes leadership decisions and unblocks them before they stall. * Drive innovation across the function; pioneer new sourcing channels, AI-enabled tooling and assessment approaches, and set the standard for how DEPT® hunts rather than inheriting it. * Build and own proactive talent pipelines and market maps so we're never starting a search cold; you know where the A-players sit, and why they'd move, before the role even opens. * Headhunt directly at the top end. You live in LinkedIn Recruiter and your own network, going after passive senior talent at rival networks and boutiques rather than waiting on inbound. * Be the face of DEPT® in the market; represent us at industry events, on panels and in the talent community, building our employer brand and a network that pays off long before we have a vacancy to fill. * Champion candidate experience across EMEA, making sure every future Depster feels the "small enough to care" side of us from first touch. * Raise the bar across the recruiting team; share playbooks, mentor, and lift how we hunt as a function. WHAT YOU’LL BRING * Significant in-house recruitment experience, inside a digital or integrated agency. You understand billability, utilisation, and agency life. * A track record of hiring across UX/UI Design, Digital Strategist, Account Management, Technical Project Management; you understand these roles and where to find the best candidates. * Experience recruiting in multiple EMEA markets; you know the difference between running a search in London, Amsterdam and Berlin, and you adapt accordingly. * Comfortable managing senior stakeholders in a matrix organisation, with the confidence to push back and lead hiring strategies. * Real direct-sourcing; Boolean, market mapping, pedigree mapping across rivals  * Data fluency; you're comfortable building and defending a hiring story with metrics, not just gut feel. * Navigational Intelligence; the instinct for how to actually get things done inside a global, fast-moving, partner-led organisation. * A proactive and autonomous mindset, balanced with the relentless curiosity to keep reinventing how we hire. * Proficient Dutch and English speaker. WHAT YOU'll GET * Social and Cultural Events, plenty of opportunities to connect with colleagues through organised activities and celebrations. * Inspirational Talks, bringing the outside in with regular guest speakers and events. * Learning and Development, supporting your growth with continuous opportunities to learn and advance. * Buddy Programme: You will be paired with a ‘Buddy’ to help you through your first weeks’ at DEPT®. * A reputation for doing good. DEPT® has been a Certified B Corp® since 2021 and named ‘Agency of the Year’ at both The Lovies and The Webby Awards. * Awesome clients. Whether big or small, local or global — at DEPT® you’ll get the opportunity to work with clients of all sizes and across all industries. And we celebrate all of our successes together! WE OFFER * A flexible, hybrid working policy (2-3 days from the office, depending on location) and the opportunity to work from abroad for 13 weeks a year.  * 24 vacation days per year and the possibility to buy an unlimited number of extra vacation days. * DEPT®/YOU Learning Menu and DEPT®/YOU Special Programs. Develop your skills with courses and programs tailored to your needs. * Stay happy and healthy with a contribution to your health through the OpenUp platform, gym and wellness discounts, and healthy lunches at the office. * Get a discount on your lease bike and ride in style. You can also enjoy hassle free-commutes with an NS Business Card.  * A reputation for doing good. DEPT® has been a Certified B Corp® since 2021, has been named a Great Place To Work since 2022 in the Netherlands and named ‘Agency of the Year’ at both The Lovies and The Webby Awards. * Awesome clients. Whether big, small, local or global — at DEPT® you’ll get the opportunity to work with all of them. And we celebrate all of our successes together! * You can discover even more employee benefits here. WHY DEPT®? We are a Growth Invention company built to help the world’s most ambitious brands grow faster. Operating at the intersection of technology and marketing, we create what is next by pioneering ideas, acting fast, and moving further because standing still just is not in our DNA. We are drawn to people who stay curious, move with intent, and never stop inventing. Our culture runs on three values: better together, relentlessly curious, and get sh*t done. It is how we work, how we grow, and how we make things that matter. At DEPT®, you will find the freedom to explore, the space to collaborate, and the trust to make a real impact for our clients, for each other, and for the world we are helping to build. DIVERSITY, EQUITY & INCLUSION At DEPT®, we take pride in creating an inclusive workplace where everyone has an equal opportunity to thrive. We actively seek to recruit, develop, nurture, and retain talented individuals from diverse backgrounds, with varying skills and perspectives. Not sure you meet all qualifications? Apply, and let us decide! Research shows that women and members of underrepresented groups tend not to apply for jobs when they think they may not meet every requirement, when in fact they do. We believe in giving everyone a fair chance to shine. We also encourage you to reach out to us and discuss any reasonable adjustments we can make to support you throughout the recruitment process and your time with us. Want to know more about our dedication to diversity, equity, and inclusion? Check out our efforts here.

DEPT

DEPT® is a Growth Invention company built to help the world’s most ambitious brands grow faster. Operating at the intersection of technology and marketing, our 4,000+ specialists deliver growth invention services across Brand & Media, Experience, Commerce, CRM, and Technology & Data. We’re 50|50 tech and marketing, partner-led, and first to move. Clients include Google, Lufthansa, Meta, eBay, and OpenAI. We have been certified B Corp and Climate Neutral since 2021. JOB PURPOSE As the Talent Acquisition Lead, you will play a pivotal role in shaping the future of our agency by developing and implementing strategic talent acquisition initiatives for our Experience & Engineering service teams across EMEA. Our Experience & Engineering teams develop technical solutions and create beautiful designs to deliver exceptional and engaging digital experiences for our clients. You will hire the talent that creates these digital engineering solutions; think Frontend Developers, Backend Developers, Adobe Specialists, AI Engineers, Data Analysts. You will embody DEPT®'s culture as the initial ambassador for candidates, ensuring a seamless and positive experience throughout their recruitment journey. By collaborating closely with leadership teams, you will gain a deep understanding of role requirements, deliver regular updates on hiring progress, and offer valuable market insights and drive informed decision-making together with the leadership team. WHAT YOU’LL DO * Alongside the Head of TA, you will develop and implement the talent strategy for our Digital Engineering services across key EMEA markets. You're shaping how we hire at the senior and strategic end, not just running the searches. * Operates as a trusted advisor to senior leadership, managing expectations, challenging the brief when the ask doesn't match reality, and turning "unicorn" requests into searchable, fillable mandates. * Use data to lead, not just report; turn hiring intelligence into the insight that shapes leadership decisions and unblocks them before they stall. * Drive innovation across the function; pioneer new sourcing channels, AI-enabled tooling and assessment approaches, and set the standard for how DEPT® hunts rather than inheriting it. * Build and own proactive talent pipelines and market maps so we're never starting a search cold; you know where the A-players sit, and why they'd move, before the role even opens. * Headhunt directly at the top end. You live in LinkedIn Recruiter and your own network, going after passive senior talent at rival networks and boutiques rather than waiting on inbound. * Be the face of DEPT® in the market; represent us at industry events, on panels and in the talent community, building our employer brand and a network that pays off long before we have a vacancy to fill. * Champion candidate experience across EMEA, making sure every future Depster feels the "small enough to care" side of us from first touch. * Raise the bar across the recruiting team; share playbooks, mentor, and lift how we hunt as a function. WHAT YOU’LL BRING * Significant in-house talent acquisition experience, inside a digital or integrated agency. You understand billability, utilisation, and agency life. * A track record of hiring across Development, AI Engineering and Data Analytics ; you understand these roles and where to find the best candidates. * Experience recruiting in multiple EMEA markets; you know the difference between running a search in London, Amsterdam and Berlin, and you adapt accordingly. * Comfortable managing senior stakeholders in a matrix organisation, with the confidence to push back and lead hiring strategies. * Real direct-sourcing; Boolean, market mapping, pedigree mapping across rivals  * Data fluency; you're comfortable building and defending a hiring story with metrics, not just gut feel. * Navigational Intelligence; the instinct for how to actually get things done inside a global, fast-moving, partner-led organisation. * A proactive and autonomous mindset, balanced with the relentless curiosity to keep reinventing how we hire. * Proficient Dutch and English speaker. WHAT YOU'll GET * Social and Cultural Events, plenty of opportunities to connect with colleagues through organised activities and celebrations. * Inspirational Talks, bringing the outside in with regular guest speakers and events. * Learning and Development, supporting your growth with continuous opportunities to learn and advance. * Buddy Programme: You will be paired with a ‘Buddy’ to help you through your first weeks’ at DEPT®. * A reputation for doing good. DEPT® has been a Certified B Corp® since 2021 and named ‘Agency of the Year’ at both The Lovies and The Webby Awards. * Awesome clients. Whether big or small, local or global — at DEPT® you’ll get the opportunity to work with clients of all sizes and across all industries. And we celebrate all of our successes together! WE OFFER * A flexible, hybrid working policy (2-3 days from the office, depending on location) and the opportunity to work from abroad for 13 weeks a year.  * 24 vacation days per year and the possibility to buy an unlimited number of extra vacation days. * DEPT®/YOU Learning Menu and DEPT®/YOU Special Programs. Develop your skills with courses and programs tailored to your needs. * Stay happy and healthy with a contribution to your health through the OpenUp platform, gym and wellness discounts, and healthy lunches at the office. * Get a discount on your lease bike and ride in style. You can also enjoy hassle free-commutes with an NS Business Card.  * A reputation for doing good. DEPT® has been a Certified B Corp® since 2021, has been named a Great Place To Work since 2022 in the Netherlands and named ‘Agency of the Year’ at both The Lovies and The Webby Awards. * Awesome clients. Whether big, small, local or global — at DEPT® you’ll get the opportunity to work with all of them. And we celebrate all of our successes together! * You can discover even more employee benefits here. WHY DEPT®? We are a Growth Invention company built to help the world’s most ambitious brands grow faster. Operating at the intersection of technology and marketing, we create what is next by pioneering ideas, acting fast, and moving further because standing still just is not in our DNA. We are drawn to people who stay curious, move with intent, and never stop inventing. Our culture runs on three values: better together, relentlessly curious, and get sh*t done. It is how we work, how we grow, and how we make things that matter. At DEPT®, you will find the freedom to explore, the space to collaborate, and the trust to make a real impact for our clients, for each other, and for the world we are helping to build. DIVERSITY, EQUITY & INCLUSION At DEPT®, we take pride in creating an inclusive workplace where everyone has an equal opportunity to thrive. We actively seek to recruit, develop, nurture, and retain talented individuals from diverse backgrounds, with varying skills and perspectives. Not sure you meet all qualifications? Apply, and let us decide! Research shows that women and members of underrepresented groups tend not to apply for jobs when they think they may not meet every requirement, when in fact they do. We believe in giving everyone a fair chance to shine. We also encourage you to reach out to us and discuss any reasonable adjustments we can make to support you throughout the recruitment process and your time with us. Want to know more about our dedication to diversity, equity, and inclusion? Check out our efforts here.

appliedAI Initiative

ÜBER UNS The appliedAI Initiative elevates Europe’s industry to become shapers in the age of AI, creating a future that we desire to live in. Through our ecosystem of strong partners, comprehensive programs, services and solutions we advance companies holistically on their AI journey. With our uniquely diverse, interdisciplinary, and driven team, we build on deep technical expertise while specializing on applicability of the solutions. We share a mindset of collaboration and openness with our ecosystem of leading companies and tech players. Our common goal is to strengthen the European landscape, jointly creating unique knowledge for applying trustworthy AI. We believe that AI Agents will be the dominant topic for AI in the near future and that appliedAI with its partner ecosystem will impact how this technology is being used in industry and beyond in Europe. DEINE AUFGABEN You build the systems other engineers learn from. At appliedAI, we help Europe’s leading companies turn ambitious AI and digitalization strategies into production-grade software - and you take end-to-end ownership of that delivery for our most complex client engagements, while setting the engineering standard that elevates the entire Engineering team. Whether your depth comes from AI/ML systems, large-scale digitalization programs, or solution architecture for complex enterprise environments, you thrive on turning ambiguity into scalable, well-governed systems. Your tasks will include: * Architecting and implementing production-grade software and AI solutions for enterprise clients - spanning classical ML, GenAI applications, validated RAG, and agentic systems, alongside the broader digital and software architecture around them - with attention to security, scalability, hybrid/cloud deployments, and operational maturity * Defining and championing engineering excellence across the team: code quality, design reviews, evaluation harnesses, observability, security, and MLOps standards * Leading technical delivery from target architecture through production hardening and client handover, working closely with engagement leads on scope and value * Building reusable engineering accelerators - templates, libraries, and evaluation frameworks - that multiply the impact of the wider Engineering team * Mentoring mid-level and senior engineers, facilitating technical guilds, and driving a culture of shared knowledge and continuous improvement DEIN PROFIL * 10+ years of software engineering experience, including a strong track record at principal or lead level - as an AI/ML engineer, software architect, digitalization lead, or solution architect - with meaningful exposure to AI/ML systems in production or a demonstrated ability to grow quickly into that depth * Deep engineering foundation across distributed systems, APIs, data pipelines, cloud-native architecture (Azure, AWS, or GCP), containers, CI/CD, and MLOps * Strong command of Python and solid exposure to the modern AI stack - LangChain/LangGraph, vector stores, evaluation frameworks, or platforms such as Azure AI Foundry - or a proven ability to master this stack rapidly given your engineering depth * A demonstrable track record leading complex, end-to-end technical delivery in client-facing settings, at enterprise scale * Pragmatic and code-first in your approach; opinionated about quality, evaluation, security, and operational maturity * Fluent in both English and German DEINE VORTEILE * A highly qualified and motivated team of ~90 people is on a journey to change the rapidly evolving European AI Landscape * Experience the best of both worlds with our hybrid work model: You can choose to work from our vibrant offices - either at the IPAI in Heilbronn or the House of Communication in Munich - while also enjoying the flexibility to work remotely a few days each week * Opportunity to shape a variety of projects and the development of new, original content based on the latest developments in AI and its adoption in businesses * An atmosphere that encourages to think and experiment in new ways with software, hardware, and processes * A highly visible initiative that helps you build a large and high-level network of start-ups, partners, and tech companies * A flexible development budget that’s yours to shape - invest it in training, certifications, conferences, or new challenges, however you want to grow * Sports membership with Wellpass to access thousands of sports facilities all over Germany (and beyond), as well as online courses * JobRad: Lease a bike for a cheaper rate via JobRad and we cover the bike insurance on top * Sabbatical option: You can take a sabbatical of up to 3 months after min. 3 years of employment - because sometimes 30 vacation days are not enough to explore the beauty of this world * PME Familienservice: A 24/7 support for a successful work & life in any life situation. Benefit from free support in areas like life coaching, child care and many other options * Mobility budget: Every month we contribute to your individual mobility usage with public transport or shared mobility offers within the app Moovster * Workation: Work from anywhere in the EU/EWR area for up to 3 months per year - combining working at a nice place and spending your leisure time in the evening like vacation KONTAKT Lucas Fernandes - Senior Talent Acquisition Specialist appliedAI Initiative GmbH, August-Everding-Str. 25, 81671 München