Community Engagement Lead - Austin, TX

About Fluidstack · At Fluidstack, we're building the infrastructure for abundant intelligence. We partner with top AI labs, governments, and enterprises - including Mistral, Poolside, Black Forest Labs, Meta, and more - to unlock compute at the speed of light. · We're working wit ...

Job description

About Fluidstack

At Fluidstack, we're building the infrastructure for abundant intelligence. We partner with top AI labs, governments, and enterprises - including Mistral, Poolside, Black Forest Labs, Meta, and more - to unlock compute at the speed of light.

We're working with urgency to make AGI a reality. As such, our team is highly motivated and committed to delivering world-class infrastructure. We treat our customers' outcomes as our own, taking pride in the systems we build and the trust we earn. If you're motivated by purpose, obsessed with excellence, and ready to work very hard to accelerate the future of intelligence, join us in building what's next.

About The Role

As Fluidstack scales its global GPU cluster footprint — across the US, Europe, and beyond — we're building new datacenters in communities that will live with them for decades. That relationship needs to be earned, not assumed.

The Community Engagement Lead will be Fluidstack's primary interface between our infrastructure projects and the communities, governments, and civic institutions that surround them. You will build trust before the first shovel hits the ground, sustain it through construction and operations, and turn neighbors, local officials, and regional stakeholders into long-term advocates. You'll own a function that sits at the intersection of public affairs, economic development, and communications — and you'll build it from scratch.

This is a high-leverage role with direct exposure to Fluidstack's leadership, site development teams, and government relations functions. You will be a material contributor to whether projects close on time or stall in council chambers.

What You'll Do

• Develop and own Fluidstack's community engagement playbook: stakeholder mapping, outreach cadences, issue escalation protocols, and community benefit frameworks — scalable across geographies and jurisdictions

• Serve as the primary face of Fluidstack in local communities where we are developing, constructing, or operating datacenter infrastructure — attending town halls, public hearings, planning commission meetings, and community events

• Build and maintain relationships with a broad stakeholder matrix: elected officials, city/county staff, utility partners, school districts, workforce development organizations, nonprofits, and community members

• Proactively identify and neutralize opposition before it organizes — distinguish between addressable concerns (noise, traffic, water, grid impact) and politically-motivated obstruction, and build tailored response strategies for each

• Partner with Site Selection, Real Estate, and Legal to integrate community dynamics early in site evaluation — surface reputational and political risk before capital is committed

• Coordinate with Economic Development to structure and communicate community benefit commitments: local hiring, workforce development programs, educational partnerships, infrastructure investment, and grants

• Develop communications materials for community audiences — fact sheets, FAQ documents, project updates, public presentations — translating complex infrastructure realities into clear, credible narratives

• Manage external community affairs consultants, PR agencies, and government relations firms in target markets

• Track and report engagement metrics, sentiment trends, and regulatory developments across active and prospective site markets; maintain a live stakeholder registry per site

• Serve as an internal advocate for community priorities — ensure construction timelines, operational parameters, and communications strategies account for local context

What We're Looking For

• 6+ years of experience in community affairs, public affairs, government relations, economic development, or a closely related function — ideally for large-scale infrastructure projects (datacenters, energy, utilities, telecom, or industrial development)

• Demonstrated track record navigating public approval processes: zoning hearings, permitting, environmental review, and community benefits negotiations

• Comfort operating in politically complex environments — you've managed organized opposition, handled hostile public hearings, and de-escalated charged local dynamics without burning relationships

• Strong grasp of the infrastructure concerns that animate community pushback: grid load and ratepayer impact, water consumption, noise, land use, tax incentives, and local employment claims

• Excellent written and verbal communication — you can write a crisp fact sheet for residents, present to a county commission, and brief an executive on political risk within the same week

• Experience building and executing community benefit programs: workforce training partnerships, educational grants, local procurement commitments

• Ability to build and manage a coalition of external partners: consultants, local nonprofits, economic development authorities, utilities

• Willingness to travel frequently to project sites — this role requires a physical presence in the communities we operate in

Nice to have:

• Experience specifically in hyperscale or AI datacenter development context

• Familiarity with energy procurement, grid interconnection, or sustainability communications

• Experience engaging with sovereign or government customers alongside private stakeholders

• Multi-jurisdictional and/or international community engagement experience

The base salary range for this position is $115,000 - $200,000 per year, depending on experience, skills, qualifications, and location. This range represents our good faith estimate of the compensation for this role at the time of posting. Total compensation may also include equity in the form of stock options.

We are committed to pay equity and transparency.

Fluidstack is an Equal Employment Opportunity Employer. All qualified applicants will receive consideration for employment without regard to race, color, religion, sex, national origin, sexual orientation, gender identity, disability and protected veterans' status, or any other characteristic protected by law. Fluidstack will consider for employment qualified applicants with arrest and conviction records pursuant to applicable law.

You will receive a confirmation email once your application has successfully been accepted. If there is an error with your submission and you did not receive a confirmation email, please email with your resume/CV, the role you've applied for, and the date you submitted your application-- someone from our recruiting team will be in touch.