Senior Talent Acquisition Manager

This position is listed on behalf of a partner company, who manages all applications and next steps. Our partner is looking for a Senior Talent Acquisition Manager based in United Kingdom. This is a high-impact talent acquisition role focused on building exceptional commercial teams across the UK and Europe. You will take ownership of senior hiring processes from initial intake through signed offer and successful onboarding. The role has a strong executive-search and headhunting focus, requiring you to identify and engage high-quality passive candidates. You will partner closely with senior hiring managers and executives, providing informed guidance on talent availability, compensation, profiles, and timelines. Success requires persistence, creativity, and the ability to build strong pipelines even for challenging or highly specialized searches. You will operate with significant autonomy while contributing sourcing expertise and best practices to an international talent acquisition team. This is an excellent opportunity for an experienced recruiter who thrives on the hunt and enjoys making a direct impact in a fast-growing global fintech environment. Accountabilities - Own full-cycle recruitment for commercial positions across the UK and Europe, covering roles from individual contributors and account managers through senior leadership. - Lead executive search assignments, including market mapping, target-company identification, talent-pool development, and direct outreach to passive candidates. - Build high-quality candidate pipelines through LinkedIn, professional communities, referrals, industry events, personal networks, and other sourcing channels. - Develop personalized outreach strategies that generate engagement from passive talent and convert initial conversations into qualified opportunities. - Partner with hiring managers and executives as a trusted talent advisor, providing insight into market conditions, candidate availability, compensation expectations, profile requirements, and realistic hiring timelines.

- Conduct thorough candidate assessments and present focused shortlists supported by clear rationale and evidence of fit. - Manage offers, negotiations, candidate expectations, and engagement throughout the recruitment process through to the candidate's first day. - Maintain accurate recruitment data and ensure the applicant tracking system remains up to date, while reporting on pipeline health, hiring activity, and results. - Share effective sourcing techniques, market knowledge, and search methodologies with the wider talent acquisition team. - Support additional business and recruitment priorities as hiring needs evolve. Requirements - 6+ years of recruitment experience, with a strong emphasis on sourcing, direct search, and headhunting. - Proven executive search experience, including successfully identifying and closing senior and C-level candidates through proactive direct approaches. - Strong track record of recruiting commercial talent, particularly across sales, business development, and account management functions in the UK and Europe. - Experience across recruitment or executive search agencies, in-house talent teams, and ideally international fintech or payments environments; alternative career paths are welcome where they demonstrate equivalent search expertise. - Highly self-driven and autonomous, with the ability to organize priorities, manage searches independently, and proactively address obstacles. - Persistent and resilient approach to recruitment, with the determination to continue engaging hard-to-reach passive candidates and build pipelines from scratch. - Strong stakeholder-management skills and confidence working with senior hiring managers, executives, and other business leaders. - Excellent candidate assessment and communication abilities, with a strong understanding of commercial talent markets.