Manager, Talent Acquisition (Skillz)

About The Company

If you want to build, own, and see your impact — join Skillz and level up your career.

Skillz is the competition infrastructure platform that powers real-money, skill-based tournaments inside mobile games. We didn't just enter the competitive gaming market — we invented it. Founded in 2012 by entrepreneur and inventor Andrew Paradise, Skillz built the category from scratch: the patented matchmaking, identity, payments, fraud protection, and developer tools that make fair, real-stakes competition possible at scale.

Skillz hosts billions of casual mobile gaming tournaments for millions of players worldwide and is revolutionizing the gaming industry. By fostering social competition within games, the Skillz platform helps developers build multi-million dollar franchises by enabling real-money activity in their games and providing operational support while connecting players through fair, enjoyable, and meaningful competition.

Today, Skillz is part of FIRY — a global holding company operating at the intersection of gaming, AI-powered performance marketing, and developer infrastructure. Alongside RZR, our AI-driven ad network, and Beamable, our backend and LiveOps platform, Skillz sits at the center of a compounding data flywheel that no standalone competitor can replicate. 800,000+ daily tournaments. $7.5 billion in lifetime prizes paid to players. 90 million registered users.

We're a high-conviction team of builders who came from Apple, Amazon, Google, Microsoft, Tesla, X, Roblox, Zynga, Samsung, Lyft, EA, Riot, Nexon, Gameskraft, PlayStation, Unity, Scopely, Tinder, Intel, Deloitte, EY, Twitch, DraftKings, Wynn Resorts, and more. We operate like a startup, hold ourselves to high standards, and move fast with purpose. If you want to work on infrastructure that matters — and be part of a team that fights for what it builds — Skillz is the right place.

About The Role

Skillz is looking for a Manager, Talent Acquisition to join our Bangalore team as second-in-command to the Senior Manager, TA. This is a hybrid role that blends hands-on recruiting with day-to-day team leadership. You'll own priority searches yourself while coaching and guiding a team of recruiters to hire high-quality talent across our technical and business functions.

You'll play a direct role in driving recruiting profitability: cutting time-to-fill, growing our direct-sourcing capability, and reducing our reliance on external agencies. At the same time, you'll build team capacity through coaching, consistent hiring standards, and hands-on problem-solving — stepping in as the Senior Manager's delegate to keep recruitment operations running smoothly as hiring demand grows.

Responsibilities

• Act as second-in-command to the Senior Manager, TA; serve as their delegate, ensuring continuity of recruitment operations, and escalating risks in their absence.
• Own full-cycle recruiting for priority and hard-to-fill roles across technical, product, data, and business functions, with an emphasis on sourcing Tier 1 talent from B2C technology companies.
• Provide day-to-day leadership to a team of recruiters including coaching, setting clear expectations, reviewing performance, and delivering feedback that improves productivity.
• Build and maintain direct-sourcing pipelines and market maps to reduce agency dependency and raise quality of hire.
• Partner with hiring managers and senior leaders to turn workforce priorities into structured search strategies and measurable hiring plans, constructively pushing back on requirements when needed.
• Track funnel metrics, conversion rates, and requisition ageing to spot bottlenecks and resolve operational blockers across the team's portfolio.
• Uphold hiring standards and process consistency to protect candidate experience and hit timelines.
• Lead offer negotiations and closing conversations, managing compensation expectations and counteroffers to land great talent within budget.
• Build lasting relationships with candidates, recruiters, hiring managers, and stakeholders across the business.
• Support the Senior Manager, TA in driving down time-to-fill and minimizing the productivity loss that comes with open roles.

Key Competencies

• Team Leadership & Coaching — guiding recruiters, setting expectations, and improving team performance.
• Technical & Business Acumen — fluent in evaluating engineering, product, and data talent from Tier 1 B2C companies.
• Strategic Recruiting — translating priorities into search strategies, market maps, and hiring plans.
• Stakeholder Management — building credibility with leaders and constructively challenging requirements.
• Execution & Accountability — strong ownership of outcomes, timelines, and candidate experience.
• Data-Driven Decision-Making — using metrics to spot risk and improve outcomes.
• Problem-Solving & Adaptability — resolving bottlenecks and thriving amid shifting priorities.
• Offer Negotiation & Closing — managing compensation conversations and counteroffers with confidence.
• Relationship Building — sustaining trust across candidates, recruiters, and stakeholders.

Experience

• 8+ years of full-cycle recruiting experience, with a strong track record hiring technical, product, data, or business talent.
• 1–2+ years formally managing, mentoring, or leading recruiters day-to-day.
• Demonstrated success hiring Tier 1 talent from B2C technology, consumer internet, gaming, fintech, e-commerce, travel-tech, food-tech, or other scaled consumer businesses.
• Experience running priority or hard-to-fill searches independently while overseeing other recruiters' delivery.
• Strong direct-sourcing skills; experience with building market maps and proactive pipelines without heavy reliance on agencies.
• End-to-end recruitment lifecycle experience: sourcing, screening, interview coordination, debriefs, references, negotiation, closing, and onboarding.
• Background in a startup, turnaround, or fast-scaling environme