---
title: 'Security Engineer at People Culture Talent'
canonical: 'https://feeny.ai/job/security-engineer-people-culture-talent-san-francisco-98xn73psp5c3'
type: 'job'
last_seen: '2026-09-15'
---

# Security Engineer at People Culture Talent

- **Company:** People Culture Talent
- **Location:** San Francisco, CA
- **Employment:** full-time
- **Work type:** onsite
- **Posted:** 2026-09-08
- **Last confirmed live:** 2026-09-15
- **Apply:** https://jobs.ashbyhq.com/people-culture-talent/a2f5e8fe-e25f-4dff-8782-aea9fc9783db

## Job description

PCT partners with venture-backed technology companies looking for Security Engineers to help build secure products, infrastructure, and organizations as they scale. Security roles across our portfolio may focus on product security, application security, cloud and infrastructure security, detection and response, security engineering, or a combination of these areas. We're interested in connecting with engineers who approach security as an engineering problem and enjoy building systems that make secure practices easier to adopt.

## What You Might Work On

- Identify, assess, and remediate security risks across applications, infrastructure, and internal systems.
- Design and build security tooling, automation, and controls.
- Partner with engineering teams to integrate security throughout the software development lifecycle.
- Conduct architecture reviews, threat modeling, and technical security assessments.
- Improve cloud, infrastructure, identity, access, and secrets-management practices.
- Develop monitoring, detection, vulnerability-management, and incident-response capabilities.
- Help engineering teams understand and address security vulnerabilities.
- Establish scalable security practices as products and organizations grow.
- Contribute to security architecture and longer-term security strategy.

## What We're Looking For

While requirements vary across our client companies, strong candidates often bring:

- Experience in security engineering, application security, product security, infrastructure security, or a related discipline.
- Strong software engineering, scripting, or automation skills.
- Knowledge of modern cloud, application, and infrastructure security concepts.
- Experience identifying vulnerabilities and translating security risks into practical technical solutions.
- Strong understanding of security principles, threat models, and common attack vectors.
- The ability to partner effectively with engineering teams rather than treating security as a separate function.
- Strong judgment and the ability to balance security, usability, speed, and business requirements.

When you apply, tell us about your primary areas of security expertise, the technical environments you've worked in, and the types of security challenges you're most interested in solving. We'll use that information to identify opportunities across our client portfolio that may be a strong fit.

## About PCT

People Culture Talent helps VCs and venture-backed startups build thriving teams through exceptional Human Capital Management. We create people-first talent strategies for high-growth companies, partnering with organizations from pre-seed to IPO to transform their growth into a masterclass in scaling with purpose.

## About Our Client Companies

PCT partners with exceptional venture-backed companies to build resilient, people-centric, diverse teams. Our clients span industries and stages, from pre-seed startups to companies preparing for IPO, including leading tech organizations like Notion, Lyft, Modern Health, Instacart, Uber, Google, Render, and GitHub. Our clients are building and scaling sophisticated technology products and are looking for security engineers who can help ensure security evolves alongside the business rather than becoming an afterthought. These companies share a commitment to building strong culture, high-performing teams, and innovative people programs. They're growing fast, scaling thoughtfully, and seeking exceptional talent to join their journey.

## About People Culture Talent

## Company Overview
- **One-liner**: People Culture Talent (PCT) partners with venture-backed startups to build exceptional teams through embedded talent search, people operations, and culture‑building services.
- **Entity Type**: Private (Bootstrapped)
- **Headquarters**: San Francisco, California, USA
- **Founded**: 2018
- **Founders**: Tianna Johnson and Caitlin Cooke

## Core Business
- **Primary industry**: Human Resources / Talent & People Operations
- **Target customers**: Venture‑backed technology startups at all stages (seed to pre‑IPO), venture capital firms, and high‑growth companies.
- **Mission**: “To build better founders and companies by creating the people, culture, and talent foundations that generational companies are made of.”

## Products & Services
PCT offers a full suite of services organized around three pillars:
- **Talent** – Retained and embedded executive search, recruiting process design, talent strategy, ATS implementation (Ashby partner), candidate experience design, and recruiting metrics.
- **Culture** – Values definition and operationalization, workplace culture development, mission/vision/framework creation, retreat/offsite planning, and employer branding.
- **People** – Organizational design & headcount planning, performance management systems, leveling & career architecture, total rewards, benefits strategy, onboarding/offboarding, payroll & HRIS implementation, manager enablement, and fractional services (marketing, customer support, L&D, Chief of Staff).

## Market Standing
- **Valuation / Market Cap**: Not publicly available (private, no disclosed funding).
- **Key Metric**: 220 total employees (as of early 2025); companies they have scaled average 300% annual growth.
- **Notable Investors / Partners**: Not an investment‑backed firm; clients and partners include Andreessen Horowitz (where co‑founder Caitlin Cooke advised portfolio companies), Ashby (premier implementation partner), Rippling, Lattice, Leapsome, Gem, Juicebox.
- **Growth Signals**: 5 offices globally (San Francisco, plus remote hubs across the U.S., Canada, Mexico, Argentina, Philippines). Currently hiring engineers (Founding Engineer, Product Engineer, Infrastructure Engineer) indicating a push to build internal platform tools. Have scaled a single client from 10 to 800 team members.

## Competitive Advantages
- **Embedded operating model** – PCT works inside the client’s tools (Slack, ATS, etc.), providing full transparency and real‑time collaboration, unlike traditional agencies.
- **Boutique by design** – The firm intentionally stays small and flat, with senior operators directly managing every engagement. No handoffs to junior consultants.
- **Proven pattern recognition** – Founders have personally scaled engineering and talent teams at Lyft (400→7,000 for IPO), GitHub (through Microsoft acquisition), Notion (20→600, $500M→$10B valuation), and ID.me (100→1,500).
- **Full‑lifecycle offering** – Covers everything from first hire to pre‑IPO people infrastructure, making it a one‑stop partner for founders.

## Strategic Focus
- Deepen the “platform” side of the business by building internal software and systems (ATS implementations, people analytics, automation).
- Expand fractional services across more functions (marketing, customer support, L&D, Chief of Staff).
- Maintain a people‑first, high‑trust culture that mirrors what they advise clients to build.
- Continue serving the venture‑backed ecosystem, from early‑stage founders to later‑stage transformations.

## Why Work Here
- **Culture**: Described as a team of seasoned operators who are “unapologetically embedded” and committed to honest counsel. Values include accountability, collaboration, and continuous learning.
- **Work style**: Hybrid environment with a mix of remote and on‑site work. Offices in San Francisco and remote hubs across multiple countries. Some roles are fully remote, others require in‑office presence (SF).
- **Team**: Small (220 employees) but expanding; direct access to founders and partners. Engineers and non‑engineering roles alike work on high‑impact projects for top VC‑backed startups.
- **Perks**: Not publicly detailed; typical benefits for a Bay Area talent firm likely include competitive compensation, flexibility, and the opportunity to shape the people‑tech ecosystem.

## Sources
1. [People.Culture.Talent. – Homepage](https://www.peopleculturetalent.com/)
2. [Who We Are – People Culture Talent](https://www.peopleculturetalent.com/who-we-are)
3. [What We Do – People Culture Talent](https://www.peopleculturetalent.com/what-we-do)
4. [Built In – People Culture Talent Profile](https://builtin.com/company/people-culture-talent)
5. [People Culture Talent – Careers Page (Ashby)](https://jobs.ashbyhq.com/people-culture-talent)

## Other roles at People Culture Talent

- [Founding Business Development Lead](https://feeny.ai/job/founding-business-development-lead-people-culture-talent-san-francisco-b6m3cfse70b9) — San Francisco, CA
- [Founding Engineer](https://feeny.ai/job/founding-engineer-people-culture-talent-san-francisco-fx2mzw6yd8b9) — San Francisco, CA
- [Forward Depolyed Engineer (FDE)](https://feeny.ai/job/forward-depolyed-engineer-fde-people-culture-talent-san-francisco-62nn65kccn5n) — San Francisco, CA
- [Infrastructure Engineer](https://feeny.ai/job/infrastructure-engineer-people-culture-talent-san-francisco-mcd3j4674w66) — San Francisco, CA
- [Founding Engineer](https://feeny.ai/job/founding-engineer-people-culture-talent-san-francisco-1wjk0jw364gj) — San Francisco, CA
- [PCT | Technical Sourcer](https://feeny.ai/job/pct-technical-sourcer-people-culture-talent-united-states-3asakrgq1hpr) — United States
- [PCT | Talent Partner](https://feeny.ai/job/pct-talent-partner-people-culture-talent-united-states-ft5963cq699p) — United States
- [Talent Engineer](https://feeny.ai/job/talent-engineer-people-culture-talent-united-states-9es37jcjc5fj) — United States
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- [Founding Product Manager](https://feeny.ai/job/founding-product-manager-people-culture-talent-san-francisco-m0nsh5jsm7b8) — San Francisco, CA