People Ops Partner / Generalist (West Coast)

About Sifted

Sifted was founded in 2015 by Kimberly Lexow and Jess Legge with a bold vision — to reimagine office food as an experience rooted in hospitality, sustainability, and intentionality.

What began as a modern take on workplace meals quickly evolved into a nationwide food platform that supports culture, community, and carbon-conscious choices across hundreds of companies. We’re not a caterer — we’re a workplace food partner.

Our team is our secret sauce — a mix of hospitality pros, culinary experts, technologists, and innovators redefining what it means to build meaningful, stable, and opportunity-filled careers in hospitality.

At Sifted, people stay, grow, and thrive — our team members remain with us three times longer than the industry average.

We offer flexibility, generous perks, and room to grow — hiring builders, operators, creatives, and craftspeople who care about making work (and workplaces) better.

At Sifted, our team culture mirrors the experiences we design for our clients:

• Creative Freedom: Everyone contributes ideas and shapes the future of our service.
• Hospitality-Driven: No matter your role, you’re in service to someone — and that matters.
• Career Growth: We invest in internal mobility, mentorship, and hands-on learning.
• People First: We support flexible work, celebrate wins, and lead with empathy.
• Real Impact: Every day, your work reduces waste, improves lives, and connects people through food.

If you’re passionate about great food, great people, and great purpose — we’d love to meet you.

About the role

The People Ops Partner / Generalist serves as Sifted’s primary employee relations and people-management resource for employees and managers throughout the Western Region. The role is responsible for providing hands-on support for employee relations matters, performance management, corrective action, workplace investigations, conflict resolution, policy interpretation, manager coaching, and related People support.

The primary focus of this position is employee relations and manager support, with additional responsibility for administrative People support, including onboarding, offboarding, employee documentation, HRIS administration, and other employee lifecycle activities.

This role should be comfortable working directly with frontline employees and managers in a fast-paced, multi-location environment, independently handling routine and moderately complex employee matters while escalating higher-risk issues to the People Ops Manager or senior leadership when appropriate.

What you'll be doing

• Serve as the primary HR resource for employee relations matters throughout the Western Region, including employee complaints, workplace conflicts, attendance issues, policy violations, misconduct, performance concerns, disciplinary matters, and manager requests for support.
• Conduct employee relations intake conversations and workplace investigations, including interviewing employees, managers, and witnesses; gathering relevant documentation; documenting findings; and identifying issues requiring additional escalation.
• Coach managers through performance management, corrective action, employee communication, conflict resolution, attendance management, and difficult personnel decisions.
• Support managers with documented coaching, written warnings, performance improvement plans, final warnings, and terminations while helping ensure disciplinary decisions are documented and applied consistently.
• Participate in disciplinary and termination conversations when HR involvement is appropriate and support follow-up with employees and managers after significant employee relations matters.
• Maintain clear, objective, timely, and confidential documentation related to complaints, investigations, discipline, performance management, and terminations.
• Identify matters involving elevated legal, compliance, employee safety, retaliation, accommodation, leave, or reputational risk and escalate them appropriately to the HR Manager or senior leadership.
• Provide employees and managers with guidance regarding Sifted policies and HR procedures and help ensure policies are implemented consistently across Western Region locations.
• Maintain awareness of recurring employee relations and people-management trends and partner with the HR Manager to identify opportunities to strengthen policies, manager training, documentation, and HR processes.
• Maintain a visible and approachable HR presence within Sifted workplaces and build trusting relationships with employees while maintaining confidentiality and appropriate professional boundaries.
• Partner with Managing Chefs, City Managers, Account Managers, Regional Managers, and other people leaders to address workplace issues, improve team management, and strengthen manager accountability.
• Support manager HR training and help leaders understand when they should independently manage an employee matter and when HR involvement is required.
• Assist with onboarding, offboarding, employee documentation, HRIS administration, employee status changes, exit interviews, file maintenance, and other HR administrative responsibilities as needed.

Our ideal candidate

• At least 5–8 years of progressive Human Resources experience, with significant direct responsibility for employee relations.
• Demonstrated experience conducting workplace investigations and supporting corrective action, performance management, and employee terminations.
• Experience coaching frontline and mid-level managers through difficult employee situations.
• Strong judgment and ability to independently manage routine and moderately complex employee relations matters while recognizing when escalation is appropriate.
• Strong written and verbal communication skills, including the ability to document investigations, employee concerns, performance matters, and disciplinary decisions clearly and objectively.
• Ability to communicate calmly and professionally during sensitive or emotionally challenging conversations.
• Strong understanding of confidentiality, documentation practices, and consistent application of company policies.
• Strong organizational skills and ability to manage multiple active employee matters simultaneously.
• Experience supporting hourly employees and distributed or multi-location workforces strongly preferred.
• Experience in hospitality, food service, retail, logistics, healthcare, manufacturing, or another operational environment strongly preferred.
• Familiarity with Washington and California employment requirements strongly preferred.
• Experience working within an HRIS; Rippling experience is a plus.
• Proficiency with Google Workspace and related business tools.
• Ability to regularly travel between Seattle-area Sifted locations and periodically travel to other Western Region markets.

Perks + benefits

• Compensation : $75,000 - 85,000 / year
• Company-sponsored health insurance plans, including 100% company-paid HDHP, as well as vision + dental opt-in
• 401(k) program after six months of employment
• Unlimited PTO; paid company holidays; paid winter break
• Monthly cell phone usage reimbursement
• Free lunch during meal service
• 100% mileage reimbursement
• Opportunities to take on larger roles within our organization
  

Job Type: Full time
Weekly day range: Monday - Friday

Eligibility : This position must maintain ServSafe Food Handler card (company-paid);

Work environment : This position is based in San Francisco, CA market and will operate out of multiple Sifted kitchens. The People Partner is expected to maintain a regular onsite presence in Sifted workplaces to build relationships with employees and managers, understand workplace dynamics, conduct employee meetings and investigations, and provide timely HR support The position may periodically travel to other Sifted Western Region markets, including Seattle and Colorado, as business needs require.

Physical requirements : This position requires the ability to lift up to 50 lbs, the ability to stand for long periods of time, and the ability to bend, squat, and reach