Engineering Lead / Engineering Manager (San Francisco)

Engineering Lead / Engineering Manager (San Francisco)

***On-site in San Francisco, If not, must willing to relocate. Open to visa transfers.

A fast-growing early-stage AI startup is looking for a Tech Lead with 4–12 years of experience to own day-to-day engineering execution. You'll formally lead 4+ engineers while remaining 20–30% hands-on with code. The ideal candidate spent several years as a senior engineer at a leading tech company or scale-up , followed by an EM or Tech Lead role at a fast-moving startup. This is 5 days/week on-site in San Francisco.

Comp: $240K–$260K base + equity

• Lead the day-to-day execution of a small, high-performing engineering team.


• Own engineering priorities, roadmaps, 1:1s, and project delivery.


• Guide architectural decisions and maintain a high bar for code quality, performance, and system design.


• Introduce processes and engineering practices that help the team ship quickly without sacrificing quality.


• Partner directly with senior leadership and customer-facing teams on technical and business priorities.


• Remain hands-on, contributing production code roughly 20–30% of your time.


• 4–12 years of software engineering experience with a strong hands-on IC foundation.


• Experience formally managing 4+ software engineers.


• Strong backend engineering experience with Python and cloud technologies.


• Ability to evaluate architecture, code quality, performance, scalability, and technical tradeoffs.


• Comfortable balancing people leadership with meaningful hands-on engineering work.


• Highly structured, proactive, and strong at prioritizing competing projects in a demanding startup environment.


• Strong communication skills and the confidence to work directly with senior company leadership.


• Willing to work 5 days/week on-site in San Francisco.


• Several years as a Senior/Staff Engineer at a leading technology company or high-growth scale-up.


• More recent experience as an Engineering Manager or Tech Lead at an early-stage startup.


• Experience with LLMs, conversational AI, AI agents, or other production AI systems.


• Founder, early-stage startup, or management consulting experience.


• Strong business acumen and an understanding of how engineering decisions affect customers and revenue.

How The Company Works

• High-growth – ARR doubled in the first half of the year , with another 2x growth target for the second half.


• Early-stage – join a small, funded team where engineering leadership has an immediate impact.


• High ownership – take responsibility for engineering execution rather than simply managing individual projects.


• Hands-on leadership – technical leaders are expected to stay close to the architecture and codebase.


• Fast-moving – priorities evolve quickly and engineers are expected to take initiative rather than wait for direction.


• High standards – the environment rewards strong execution, clear communication, and people who make the engineers around them better.


• AI-native – building production AI systems that automate real-world customer interactions.