Full-Time

Human Resources Director

Venue Operations

Updated on 9/4/2026

Pinnacle Live

Pinnacle Live

201-500 employees

Delivers live event experiences for hotels

Compensation Overview

$150k - $175k/yr

+ Incentives

Dallas, TX, USA

Hybrid

Hybrid role based in the United States, with a preference for Dallas and approximately 30–40% travel.

Bachelor's

Category
People & HR (1)
Required Skills
Human Resources Information System (HRIS)
Data Analysis

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Requirements
  • A bachelor's degree in Human Resources, Business, or a related field, or an equivalent combination of education and directly related professional experience.
  • Ten or more years of progressive HR experience, including multi-site or multi-location responsibility.
  • Experience serving as the senior HR partner to executive-level leaders at the C-suite or SVP level.
  • Experience leading HR for a distributed, multi-location business of 800 or more employees.
  • Experience supporting an hourly, shift-based, or event-driven frontline workforce.
  • Direct experience conducting and documenting workplace investigations, including complaints involving harassment and discrimination.
  • Working knowledge of employment law across multiple states, including Title VII, ADA, FMLA, FLSA exemption classification, and state wage and hour requirements such as overtime, meal and rest periods, timekeeping, and on-call or reporting-time pay.
  • Experience partnering on workplace safety, injury reporting, and workers' compensation claims management.
  • Experience managing performance improvement and involuntary separation processes, including documentation and risk assessment.
  • HRIS and data fluency, including the ability to analyze turnover, headcount, and engagement data and present findings to leadership.
  • Ability to travel regularly to partner venues, approximately 25%, including overnight travel.
  • Ability to establish credibility with and influence operations executives who hold profit-and-loss accountability.
  • Ability to influence without direct authority across an autonomous, decentralized venue model.
  • Strong conflict resolution and de-escalation skills.
  • Sound judgment in assessing employee relations risk and determining when to escalate to legal counsel.
  • Ability to communicate clearly and credibly with both frontline team members and executive audiences.
  • Ability to manage a high case volume alongside competing strategic priorities.
  • High discretion and judgment in handling sensitive and confidential information.
  • Ability to sit at a desk; stand or walk for long periods, including up and down stairs; bend and stoop; use hands to hold, handle, or feel; reach with hands and arms; talk, hear, and communicate; and lift up to 50 pounds occasionally.
Responsibilities
  • Serve as the primary HR partner to the COO and SVP leaders across all partner venues.
  • Coach and develop the COO, SVPs, and Regional Business Partners on people leadership, coaching, and performance conversations.
  • Advise operations leadership on organizational design, span of control, and team structure at the venue and regional level.
  • Lead workforce planning, staffing, and scheduling strategy for a large, distributed, frontline audiovisual and production workforce.
  • Partner with Talent Acquisition to forecast venue staffing needs and reduce time-to-fill for technician and venue leadership roles.
  • Partner with Total Rewards on job banding and pay practices specific to venue and technician roles.
  • Own employee relations case management, investigations, and performance management at the venue level.
  • Conduct and document workplace investigations, including complaints involving harassment, discrimination, and policy violations, in partnership with legal counsel.
  • Ensure consistent application of HR policy, wage and hour practice, and labor law compliance across all venue jurisdictions.
  • Oversee the ADA interactive process and accommodation decisions for venue team members in partnership with Total Rewards.
  • Partner with Operations and Risk on workplace safety, injury reporting, workers' compensation claims, and return-to-work programs.
  • Drive retention and engagement programs tailored to frontline, shift-based, and event-driven work schedules.
  • Analyze turnover, engagement, and exit data by venue and region, and develop targeted interventions with operations leadership.
  • Support the people integration of teams joining Pinnacle Live through new venue openings and acquisitions.
  • Perform other duties as assigned.
Desired Qualifications
  • Experience in live events, audiovisual or production services, hospitality, distribution, manufacturing, or another multi-unit, field-based service business.
  • Labor relations experience, including collective bargaining agreement interpretation and grievance handling.
  • Working knowledge of Canadian provincial employment standards.
  • Experience leading or developing HR business partners.
  • Experience supporting new location openings and merger and acquisition people integration.
  • Experience in a high-growth or private equity-backed environment.
  • Professional working proficiency in Spanish or another language spoken by the frontline workforce.
  • SHRM-CP, SHRM-SCP, PHR, or SPHR certification.

Pinnacle Live designs and manages live event experiences that partner with premiere hotels, customers, and industry partners. Its core offering is to create events that connect people across the hotel, guest, and partner ecosystem, delivering memorable interactions and community engagement. The process involves coordinating venues, attendees, sponsors, and partners to stage events that emphasize human connections and shared experiences rather than just a standard gathering. What makes Pinnacle Live different from competitors is its focus on the hospitality ecosystem and its emphasis on building deep, lasting connections among guests, partners, and communities through a modern, integrated approach to live events that leverages hotels as central hubs for experiences. The company’s goal is to unleash the power of live events by fostering meaningful human connections at scale, enhancing value for hotels, sponsors, attendees, and the broader community.

Company Size

201-500

Company Stage

N/A

Total Funding

N/A

Headquarters

Arlington Heights, Illinois

Founded

2021

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Simplify Jobs

Simplify's Take

What believers are saying

  • June 2026 added Preston and Urbine, strengthening HR and venue-sales execution.
  • February 2026 IHS provider-network visibility expands lead flow among hospitality buyers.
  • Falcon Events integration broadens creative, technical, and logistics capabilities for larger enterprise events.

What critics are saying

  • Jackson v. Pinnacle Live, LLC filed November 2025 brings employment-discrimination exposure.
  • Rapid hotel expansion strains service quality, and one bad flagship event damages trust fast.
  • AV and event production remain fragmented; entrenched hotel vendors can undercut margins by 2027.

What makes Pinnacle Live unique

  • Pinnacle Live embeds AV teams inside hotels, making service feel like a property function.
  • By August 2026, it operated 200+ hotels, including Marriott Marquis and Fontainebleau.
  • Edge by Pinnacle Live, launched January 2025, adds experiential brand activation services.

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Benefits

Performance Bonus

Paid Vacation

Paid Sick Leave

Paid Holidays

401(k) Company Match

Health Insurance

Vision Insurance

Dental Insurance

Company News

Pinnacle Live
Jun 24th, 2026
Pinnacle Live strengthens executive team with two senior appointments to support national growth.

Pinnacle Live strengthens executive team with two senior appointments to support national growth. ARLINGTON HEIGHTS, IL, June 24, 2026 - Pinnacle Live, a leading in-house audiovisual and event production partner for hotels in North America, today announced the appointments of Kenneth Preston as Chief Human Resources Officer and April Urbine as Senior Vice President of Venue Sales. The dual appointments reflect the company's continued investment in leadership infrastructure - building both the people foundation and the commercial engine required to sustain its next phase of growth. The appointments follow the recent announcement of Paul Lowenthal as Chief Operating Officer and Felicia Hamerman as Chief Marketing Officer, marking the company's latest wave of senior leadership investment as it scales to meet growing demand from hotel partners nationwide. "We are building one of the strongest leadership teams in this industry, and Kenneth and April are exactly the caliber of leaders that ambition demands," said Natalie De Fazio, CEO of Pinnacle Live. "Kenneth gives us the HR foundation to attract and develop the talent that makes every client experience exceptional. April gives us a proven sales leader who has spent her career building the kinds of deep, trust-based relationships that define how we operate." Kenneth Preston - Chief Human Resources Officer As CHRO, Kenneth Preston will lead the end-to-end HR strategy, including international HR operations, talent, organizational design, and culture for Pinnacle Live. He joins the company following a distinguished 14-year career at Amazon, where he served in progressive executive HR leadership roles and collaborated alongside some of the industry's foremost global businesses and technology experts. Most recently, Kenneth served as HR Director within Amazon's Devices & Services including Alexa, Echo and Health Technology businesses as well as leading the Devices and Services international HR organizations. Known for aligning people strategy directly with business growth agendas, his tenure also included leading HR for Global Delivery Services encompassing but not limited to Last Mile Delivery, Global Mile and associated technology teams. He has led international expansions across Asia, Europe, and the Middle East. Prior to Amazon, Kenneth held progressive leadership roles at Visteon Corporation and Honeywell Specialty Materials. He is an alumnus of the University of Illinois, Urbana-Champaign and Frostburg State University. "What drew me to Pinnacle Live is a culture that is already winning," said Kenneth Preston, Chief Human Resources Officer. "This company has a clear identity, a strong sense of purpose, and real momentum in the market. The organizations that thrive during periods of aggressive expansion are those that build the talent, skills, and infrastructure to scale seamlessly. My job is to ensure our people strategy matches that ambition - attracting exceptional talent, investing in our teams, and building the infrastructure that allows Pinnacle Live to scale while preserving what makes Pinnacle Live great." April Urbine - Senior Vice President of Venue Sales April Urbine brings more than three decades of hospitality sales leadership to Pinnacle Live. A results-driven executive known for building high-performing sales teams and cultivating lasting client relationships, April has led sales strategy across some of the industry's most recognized brands and portfolios. She spent 23 years at Wyndham, rising from VP of Property Sales to VP of Global Sales - a tenure that gave her deep expertise in national account management, brand strategy, and scaling commercial teams across diverse markets. April then served for a decade as SVP of Venue Sales at ClubCorp (now Invited), leading sales across a diverse portfolio of private country clubs, business clubs, and stadium clubs. Most recently, she served as National Director of Sales & Marketing at Red Roof Inn, part of Westmont Hospitality's 750-hotel portfolio. At Pinnacle Live, April leads the venue sales teams that serve meeting planners and event clients across the company's hotel portfolio, while deepening the collaborative relationships that define Pinnacle Live's approach to hotel partnerships. "Pinnacle Live has built something genuinely different in this industry," said April Urbine, Senior Vice President of Venue Sales. "Hotel partners deserve a real choice - a partner who shows up as an extension of their team, not just a vendor. I've spent my career building those kinds of relationships, and I'm excited to bring that approach to a company that has made it their competitive identity." Pinnacle Live has differentiated itself through a partner-first operating model, embedding its teams within hotel properties as an extension of each hotel's brand and service culture. The appointments of Preston and Urbine continue that investment - and reflect the scale of what Pinnacle Live is building. Having grown from 45 venues to more than 200 hotels and resorts in three years - including the New York Marriott Marquis, Fontainebleau Miami Beach, and JW Marriott Miami Turnberry Resort & Spa - the company is deepening the leadership bench required to sustain that momentum and deliver a consistently elevated experience across the most iconic venues in hospitality.

Bay Area Business Travel Association
Apr 15th, 2025
Travel News from PR Newswire

CHICAGO, April 15, 2025 /PRNewswire/ - Pinnacle Live has appointed Richard Maranville as Chief Technology Officer.

KTBS 3
Jan 13th, 2025
Edge, By Pinnacle Live: Pinnacle Live positioned to disrupt experiential event space

CHICAGO, Jan. 13, 2025 /PRNewswire/ - Pinnacle Live proudly announces the launch of Edge by Pinnacle Live, a full-service experience agency dedicated to delivering integrated, immersive brand activations and live events.

PR Newswire
May 9th, 2024
Experience Pinnacle Live Announces Acquisition of Falcon Events

Experience Pinnacle Live announces acquisition of Falcon Events.