HR Generalist I
Description
About the Museum
The Denver Museum of Nature & Science is a catalyst — we ignite our community's passion for nature and science. With 450+ employees serving guests 363 days a year, we're a nonprofit cultural institution where dinosaurs, distant galaxies, gems, mummies, and the people who care about them all share a building. Our work happens in galleries, labs, classrooms, behind-the-scenes collections, and yes, the HR office.
About the HR Team
We are strategic HR partners dedicated to empowering our leaders and staff to build cultures of intention — with employee programs that attract, engage, and develop our organization's core: its people.
About the Role
This is an HR Generalist role with real business partner range. You'll handle the day-to-day work that keeps a 450+ person operation running — onboarding, employee relations, benefits questions, leave administration, HRIS hygiene — while also sitting at the table with department leaders to connect people strategy to what they're actually trying to accomplish. One day you're coaching a new supervisor through a tough conversation. The next you're helping a director think through staffing for a new exhibit opening.
If you like variety and want real exposure to leaders at every level while enjoying the perks of working in a Museum, keep reading.
Job Class: Full-Time
Hiring Range: $75,000 - $80,000
Work Schedule: Monday - Friday. Hybrid - Up to 2 days remote after 6 months.
Direct Reports: 0
Hiring Range: $75,000 - $80,000
Work Schedule: Monday - Friday. Hybrid - Up to 2 days remote after 6 months.
Direct Reports: 0
Essential Duties
- Serve as the first HR point of contact for assigned departments - answering questions, troubleshooting issues, and knowing when to escalate
- Partner with managers on employee relations: investigations, performance conversations, corrective action, and the occasional "how do I even start this conversation" coaching call
- Work alongside leadership to align short- and long-term people strategies with operational goals — workforce planning, org design questions, retention patterns, team health
- Translate HR policy into plain English for staff and into clear recommendations for leaders
- Manage full-cycle onboarding and offboarding so new hires feel welcomed and departing employees leave with dignity
- Administer leaves of absence (FMLA, ADA accommodations, state leave programs) with care and compliance
- Maintain accurate employee data in our HRIS and pull reports that actually answer the question being asked
- Support performance management cycles, compensation reviews, and engagement survey follow-through
- Contribute to HR projects — handbook updates, training rollouts, inclusivity initiatives, process improvements
- Help build a workplace that reflects the Museum's mission internally, not just on the gallery walls
Minimum Qualifications/Requirements
- Minimum of 3 years of HR experience, with at least 2 in a generalist capacity
- Bachelor's degree in HR, business, organizational development, or related field — or equivalent experience
- Working knowledge of federal and Colorado employment law
- Experience with an HRIS (we use Dayforce; or comparable systems)
- Ability to handle confidential information with sound judgment
- Comfort working with employees across very different functions — scientists, educators, custodians, executives, retail staff, security officers — and adjusting your communication accordingly
Preferred Qualifications
- Experience in a nonprofit, cultural institution, or other 7-day operation
- Exposure to HR business partnering
- Bilingual English/Spanish
Knowledge, Skills & Abilities
- Business curiosity. You ask managers about their work, not just their headcount. You understand that good people strategy starts with understanding what the team is trying to do.
- Coaching instinct. You can guide a new supervisor through their first hard conversation without taking it over.
- Service mindset. Someone who treats every request as worth doing well and every employee as worth showing up for.
- Grit. You stay with hard problems, hard conversations, and long projects until the work is actually done.
- Equity and inclusion at the core. You're a passionate supporter of equity and inclusion — and you bring that lens to the everyday work, not just the big initiatives.
- Bridge builder. You connect people: HR to employees, employees to leaders, the Museum to the broader community.
- Emotional resilience. This work is heavy sometimes. You manage your own bandwidth, know when to step back, and treat self-care as part of doing the job well — not separate from it.
- Judgment under ambiguity. Employment situations rarely come with clean answers. You can weigh competing interests, consult the right people, and recommend a path forward.
- Operational follow-through. You close loops. If you say you'll get back to someone Thursday, you do.
- Plain communication. You can explain a benefits change to a part-time educator and a leave policy to a VP using the right register for each.
- Collaborative orientation. HR is a team sport here. You share information, back up your colleagues, and don't hoard work.
- Data comfort. You don't need to be an analyst, but you can pull a report, spot a trend, and translate it into something a department head can act on.
Application Instructions
Please submit your resume by 6:00 p.m. MT on Friday, June 12th. Applications will not be accepted after this time. DMNS reserves the right to close the position prior to this date. Applications may only be accepted electronically via the Museum's website.
DMNS Core Values
- We love science.
- We are curious, creative, and playful.
- We cultivate relationships with each other, diverse communities, the environment, and for our future.
- We think critically and act with empathy.
Perks of Working at DMNS
Click HERE (https://www.dmns.org/about/careers/benefits/) to learn more about the benefits package offered to DMNS staff.
Due to the high volume of people who apply, we are not able to respond to specific inquiries regarding your application status.
The Denver Museum of Nature & Science is an equal opportunity employer. The Museum is dedicated to the goal of building a culturally diverse staff committed to serving the needs of all our visitors, and we encourage applications from individuals of all backgrounds.