Edtech.com's Summary

Coursera is hiring a Senior Director, Global People Business Partners. This role involves leading and developing a global HR Business Partner team, driving people strategy, fostering a high-performance culture, and collaborating closely with executive leadership to align HR initiatives with business goals.

Highlights

Lead and develop a global HR Business Partner team focused on innovation and strategic alignment.
Cultivate a high-performance, agile, and resilient company culture.
Coach leadership on change management, team growth, and engagement.
Develop and implement employee engagement strategies to enhance satisfaction and reduce turnover.
Support executive leaders with people strategy and manage cross-functional partnerships.
Balance tactical execution with strategic transformational initiatives.
Lead organizational and talent transformations, including annual planning.
Requires 15+ years progressive HR experience and 8+ years of management in tech industry.
Proven experience in product, engineering, or go-to-market HR functions.
Compensation ranges from $160,000 to $251,000 USD depending on location with eligibility for bonuses and equity.

Senior Director, Global People Business Partners Full Description

Coursera was launched in 2012 by Andrew Ng and Daphne Koller with a mission to provide universal access to world-class learning. It is now one of the largest online learning platforms in the world, with 183 million registered learners as of June 30, 2025. Coursera partners with over 350 leading university and industry partners to offer a broad catalog of content and credentials, including courses, Specializations, Professional Certificates, and degrees. Coursera’s platform innovations enable instructors to deliver scalable, personalized, and verified learning experiences to their learners. Institutions worldwide rely on Coursera to upskill and reskill their employees, citizens, and students in high-demand fields such as GenAI, data science, technology, and business. Coursera is a Delaware public benefit corporation and a B Corp.

We’re a global platform aiming to transform lives through learning by offering transformative courses, certificates, and degrees that empower learners worldwide to advance their careers through skill mastery. We’re looking for inventors, innovators, and lifelong learners eager to shape the future of education. If you’re ready to build the global programs and tools that fuel the power of online learning, join Team Coursera.

At Coursera, we are committed to building a globally diverse team and are thrilled to extend employment opportunities to individuals in any country where we have a legal entity. We require candidates to possess eligible working rights and have a compatible timezone overlap with their team to facilitate seamless collaboration.

Coursera has a commitment to enabling flexibility and workspace choices for employees. Our interviews and onboarding are entirely virtual, providing a smooth and efficient experience for our candidates. As an employee, we enable you to select your main way of working, whether it's from home, one of our offices or hubs, or a co-working space near you.

Job Overview:

Coursera seeks an experienced Senior Director of Global People Business Partners to help develop a high-performance global organization. In this role, you will be instrumental in forging strong relationships with executive members and leading a high-caliber team of People Partners. Your strategic insight will be crucial in evolving our people strategy, reinforcing global human resource processes, and fostering an environment of continual transformation and agility. With a focus on cultivating a performance-driven culture, your leadership will ensure Coursera's position as a competitive and sought-after employer, where business-aligned HR initiatives empower employee engagement and drive impactful business outcomes.

Responsibilities:

Lead and develop the HR Business Partner team focused on innovation, collaboration, and strategic alignment, enabling them to proactively support and drive the company's objectives.
Cultivate a high-performance culture that embraces agility and resilience to navigate and thrive in a changing environment. Build and nurture a company culture where employees are deeply invested in Coursera's mission, demonstrating strong engagement and alignment with organizational values.
Empower and coach leadership to effectively manage change, and foster team growth, performance, and engagement.
Develop engagement strategies targeting various employee demographics to enhance workplace satisfaction, drive innovation, and reduce turnover.
Drive the adoption and implementation of HR initiatives at every organizational layer, ensuring these programs resonate with employees and align with their professional growth, values, and high-performance culture
Directly support executive business leaders with people strategy and key programs. Build and manage strong cross-functional partnerships within HR (Talent Acquisition, Total Rewards, Talent Management) and across the business (functional leaders, Finance, Legal).
Effectively balance tactical execution work and process improvements with strategic transformational initiatives.
Lead organizational and talent transformations, including annual planning cycles, ensuring alignment across functions and long-term business priorities.
Travel will be required (10%)

Basic Qualifications:

Bachelor's degree in HR, Business Administration, or a related field
15+ years of progressive HR experience
8+ years of direct management experience overseeing HR functions or business partner teams
Proven tech industry experience, in Product and Engineering or GTM
Demonstrates a hands-on approach, with experience in developing and scaling total rewards, talent management and manager/leadership programs in a high-growth environment
Self-starter with the ability to thrive as a player-coach, balancing near-term execution with long-term transformational strategy.
Excellent communicator, ability to simplify complex concepts and influence at all levels

Preferred Qualifications:

Master's degree in HR, Business Administration, or a related field
Experience managing people programs in Asia Pacific and especially India
Strong advocate for diversity, equity, and inclusion, integrating these principles into effective people programs
Proven track record of success in project management and operational execution, with a strong focus on data-driven HR solutions
Demonstrated skill and commitment to both leading the BP team and acting as a key people strategist and trusted business advisor to senior executives, as well as a builder of processes and structure

[FOR US ROLES ONLY]

Compensation

US Zone 1

$200,000 - 251,000 USD

US Zone 2

$170,000 - 213,500 USD

US Zone 3

$160,000 - 201,000 USD

The range(s) listed above is the expected annual base salary for this role, subject to change.

Salary is just one component of Coursera’s total rewards package. All regular employees are also eligible for a bonus program and equity in the form of RSU’s.

A number of factors are taken into account when determining pay, which includes: job level, location, training/education, business need, skill set and internal equity.

Current Zone Locations:

Zone 1- San Francisco Metro, New York City Metro or Seattle Metro
Zone 2 - CA (outside of SF Bay Area), CO, CT, DC, GA, IL, MA, MD, NY/NJ (other than NYC), OR, RI, TX, VA, WA (other than Seattle)
Zone 3 - all other US locations

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Coursera is an Equal Employment Opportunity Employer and considers all qualified applicants without regard to race, color, religion, sex, sexual orientation, gender identity, age, marital status, national origin, protected veteran status, disability, or any other legally protected class.

If you are an individual with a disability and require a reasonable accommodation to complete any part of the application process, please contact us at accommodations@coursera.org.

For California Candidates, please review our CCPA Applicant Notice here.

For our Global Candidates, please review our GDPR Recruitment Notice here.

Original Job Description