Senior Director, Employee Relations & Compliance

Bellevue, Washington; Chicago, Illinois; New York, New York; San Francisco, California

Get to know Okta

Okta is The World’s Identity Company. We free everyone to safely use any technology, anywhere, on any device or app. Our flexible and neutral products, Okta Platform and Auth0 Platform, provide secure access, authentication, and automation, placing identity at the core of business security and growth.

At Okta, we celebrate a variety of perspectives and experiences. We are not looking for someone who checks every single box - we’re looking for lifelong learners and people who can make us better with their unique experiences. 

Join our team! We’re building a world where Identity belongs to you.

About the Role
We are seeking a strategic and highly experienced Senior Director of Employee Relations and Compliance (ER&C) to lead our global Employee Relations and Compliance function. This role is pivotal in defining how we build and maintain trust, ensure fairness, mitigate risk, and provide employee support across the organization. You will be responsible for scaling ER&C operations, navigating complex and high-visibility employee matters, and partnering with Legal, Senior Leaders, and HR partners to strengthen the organizational culture and enhance the workplace experience.

This leader will balance strategic influence with hands-on operational excellence, build and mentor a global team of ER&C professionals, drive data-informed improvements, and ensure our practices are not only consistent and equitable but also agile enough to support a rapidly scaling, global technology company.

What You’ll Do

Strategic Leadership 

  • Define and evolve the global ER strategy, frameworks, and policies to align with our high-growth trajectory.
  • Lead, develop, and inspire a high-performing global team, fostering a culture of trusted partnership and expert issue management.
  • Drive key strategic initiatives, including the integration of ER&C processes into HR systems such as ServiceNow and Workday, and ensure compliance with emerging regulations, such as the EU Pay Transparency Directive.

Crisis & Risk Management

  • Serve as the lead escalation point for the most complex and sensitive ER&C matters, including large-scale organizational changes and crisis situations.
  •  Oversee complex investigations, ensuring outcomes are consistent, legally sound, and reinforce our company values.
  • Proactively identify and mitigate ER&C risks by analyzing trends and anticipating systemic issues before they impact the business.
  • Partner with Legal and Security on any escalations and mitigate active risk while assessing root cause and developing remediation plans.

Data & Insights

  • Champion the use of ER&C analytics to deliver insights that inform business decisions, shape policy, and improve the employee experience.  
  • Translate complex data into clear, strategic recommendations for senior leadership that drive proactive organizational and process changes. 
  • Evolve our reporting capabilities to measure the impact and efficiency of ER&C programs and services. 

Enablement & Advisory

  • Act as a trusted advisor to senior leaders, People Business Partners, and COEs on organizational design, leadership effectiveness, and critical ER&C  decisions.
  • Partner with Legal, Compliance, Security, and HR COEs to design and implement robust policies, training, and incident response protocols.
  • Enhance manager capability and accountability in handling complex workplace concerns through targeted, data-informed enablement. 

What Success Looks Like

  • A globally consistent, scalable, and data-driven ER&C function with strong governance.
  • ER&C insights are integral to strategic planning, risk mitigation, and proactive cultural initiatives.
  • The ER&C team is recognized as a trusted partner and a highly valued center of excellence by leadership. 
  • A demonstrable track record of successfully leading the people-related aspects of large-scale, complex business transformations. 
  •  

What You Bring

Experience & Expertise

  • 10+ years progressive experience in employee relations, employment law, or HR leadership in a global, fast-paced tech or similar environment.
  • Proven track record leading global ER&C functions, scaling global processes, and leveraging metrics for large, complex global organizations.
  • Deep proficiency in investigations, conflict resolution, risk mitigation, global compliance, and performance management. 

Leadership & Strategic Skills

  • Exceptional judgment with the ability to influence senior leaders and cross-functional stakeholders.
  • Ability to translate data and trends into action.
  • Strong coach and mentor with demonstrated ability to develop ER&C talent. 

Personal Attributes

  • High emotional intelligence and empathy balanced with sound business judgment.
  • Credibility as a partner to senior stakeholders.
  • Comfort navigating ambiguity and change with urgency and care. 

Preferred Qualifications

  • Experience leading ER&C across global, hybrid, and distributed environments.
  • Familiarity with employment law and compliance frameworks across key jurisdictions.
  • Background in technology, software, or high-growth industries. 
  • JD or relevant legal expertise.

Why You’ll Love This Role
You’ll lead a highly talented global team helping shape how people experience fairness, trust, and accountability in the workplace. You will operate at the intersection of culture, compliance, leadership development, and organizational performance — playing a critical role in enabling our people to thrive. You’ll partner with organizations all across the enterprise to help Okta achieve its vision: to accelerate a world where everyone can safely use any technology.  to enable  everyone to safely use technology.

  Okta’s Top 5 Core Leadership Competencies are part of the deeply ingrained principles that guide all of our company’s actions. They also align strongly to our cultural cornerstones, our Okta values: love our customers, empower our people, never stop innovating, act with integrity, and maintain transparency. It’s our expectation that our managers and leaders embody these core competencies:
  • Builds Effective Teams: Building strong-identity teams that apply their diverse skills and perspectives to achieve common goals.          
  • Demonstrates Self-Awareness (EQ): Using a combination of feedback and reflection to gain productive insight into personal strengths and weaknesses.
  • Develops Talent: Developing people to meet both their career goals and the organization’s goals.
  • Drives Results: Consistently achieving results, even under tough circumstances.
  • Strategic Mindset: Seeing ahead to future possibilities and translating them into breakthrough strategies.
The annual base salary range for this position for candidates located in the San Francisco Bay area is between: $260,000—$325,000 USD

Below is the annual base salary range for candidates located in California (excluding San Francisco Bay Area), Colorado, Illinois, New York and Washington. Your actual base salary will depend on factors such as your skills, qualifications, experience, and work location. In addition, Okta offers equity (where applicable), bonus, and benefits, including health, dental and vision insurance, 401(k), flexible spending account, and paid leave (including PTO and parental leave) in accordance with our applicable plans and policies. To learn more about our Total Rewards program please visit: https://rewards.okta.com/us.   

The annual base salary range for this position for candidates located in California (excluding San Francisco Bay Area), Colorado, Illinois, New York, and Washington is between:$232,000—$290,000 USD

What you can look forward to as a Full-Time Okta employee!

Okta cultivates a dynamic work environment, providing the best tools, technology and benefits to empower our employees to work productively in a setting that best and uniquely suits their needs. Each organization is unique in the degree of flexibility and mobility in which they work so that all employees are enabled to be their most creative and successful versions of themselves, regardless of where they live. Find your place at Okta today! https://www.okta.com/company/careers/.

Some roles may require travel to one of our office locations for in-person onboarding.

Okta is an Equal Opportunity Employer. All qualified applicants will receive consideration for employment without regard to race, color, religion, sex, sexual orientation, gender identity, national origin, ancestry, marital status, age, physical or mental disability, or status as a protected veteran. We also consider for employment qualified applicants with arrest and convictions records, consistent with applicable laws.

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Okta
The foundation for secure connections between people and technology

Okta is the leading independent provider of identity for the enterprise. The Okta Identity Cloud enables organizations to securely connect the right people to the right technologies at the right time. With over 7,000 pre-built integrations to applications and infrastructure providers, Okta customers can easily and securely use the best technologies for their business. More than 19,300 organizations, including JetBlue, Nordstrom, Slack, T-Mobile, Takeda, Teach for America, and Twilio, trust Okta to help protect the identities of their workforces and customers.

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