People Operations Manager

About Northwood:

Northwood is a modern space infrastructure company focused on connecting space and Earth. The world runs on space. Space will run on Northwood. Our global ground network ensures that missions ranging from national security, to global connectivity, to disaster response can unlock their full potential and operate every day without fail.

Role:

We are hiring an HR Generalist to own and scale Northwood’s core people operations, with a focus on HRIS administration and employee benefits. This role will be a key partner to the People team and the broader organization, ensuring accurate systems, compliant processes, and a great employee experience as we grow.

You will own the day-to-day management of our HR systems and benefits programs, serving as the primary administrator of Rippling and a trusted partner to employees and managers across all people operations.

Responsibilities

• Own end-to-end People Operations programs, including policies, performance management, benefits, compliance, and employee lifecycle processes across a rapidly scaling organization

• Lead benefits administration across medical, dental, vision, FSA, and related programs, including renewals, open enrollment planning, employee communications, and day-to-day support

• Serve as a primary point of contact for employee questions related to benefits, payroll, HR policies, and HR systems, ensuring a high-quality employee experience

• Own day-to-day administration of Northwood’s HRIS (Rippling), including employee lifecycle changes, data integrity, reporting, audits, and ongoing system optimization

• Ensure ongoing compliance with federal, state, and local employment regulations (with particular focus on California & Washington DC)

• Partner with leadership and People partners to support annual performance and compensation review cycles.

• Build and continuously improve scalable onboarding and off boarding programs, documentation, and People processes that support a high-growth

Basic Qualifications

• 5+ years of People Operations, HR, or HR Program ownership experience, with demonstrated end-to-end responsibility for core people programs

• Experience supporting a high-growth startup environment, including scaling processes ahead of headcount thresholds (e.g., 200+ employees)

• Strong working knowledge of California employment compliance, including ongoing obligations beyond onboarding (policies, training, audits, wage/hour, leaves, postings)

• Hands-on experience owning benefits administration and open enrollment processes, including planning, communications, and employee support

• Direct experience managing leaves of absence (e.g., FMLA, CFRA, PDL, parental, medical), with an understanding of compliance nuances

• Proven ability to own HR data accuracy, reporting, audits, and systems

• Experience administering and optimizing an HRIS, with a strong operational mindset and attention to detail

Preferred Qualifications

• Experience in ITAR-regulated environments or within aerospace, defense, or similarly regulated industries

• Hands-on experience implementing, configuring, or optimizing Rippling

• Strong operator mindset with the ability to design processes, anticipate risk, and build scalable systems ahead of growth