Founders Associate Intern (m/f/d)

As Founders Associate Intern (m/f/d), you'll work directly for our two founders. Your mission: help us hire exceptional people and move the founders' most important projects forward. Unlike most Founders Associate internships, you'll get visible ownership of recruiting from week one — at our stage, hiring is the founders' most important job, and you'll be at the centre of it.

What You'll Do

• Recruiting (core): source and longlist candidates, keep pipelines current, coordinate scheduling, and shape our candidate experience and employer branding.

• Strategic projects: research and analyses for founder decisions; first drafts of decks, memos, and investor updates — owned end-to-end.

• Founder office: prepare and follow up key meetings, track action items, and keep the operating cadence moving.

• Strong student or recent graduate with proof you perform at the top of your peer group — a demanding internship, founding experience, or real leadership somewhere.

• Ideally - previous internships in quantitative, fast-paced environments, e.g. consulting, investing, tech

• A people-person with excellent written German (native/fluent) and English — you write messages people answer.

• Structured, discreet, and reliable: you keep pipelines, trackers, and confidences.

• Curious about AI, startups, and how companies are actually built.

• Available full-time for 4–6 months in Berlin (hybrid).

• The closest seat to two founders scaling a VC-backed company — hiring, strategy, and fundraising from the inside

• Real ownership: your sourcing fills real roles, your drafts go to real investors — and a genuine shot at a full-time offer

• Fair internship compensation, Deutschlandticket or Urban Sports Club, and regular team events

Sounds like you? We'd love to hear from you. smalt is an equal-opportunity employer — we welcome applications from people of all backgrounds.