Founding Engineer
$140k - $180kClera
Job Description
Job Description
About the Role
Join a small, high-velocity founding team as engineer #4, working directly with the CTO and fellow founding engineers at an AI-powered talent acquisition startup in San Francisco. This is a hands-on, high-ownership role where you'll ship features to production daily and drive entire product areas from concept to deployment.
The company is building fully agentic systems that automate complex recruiting and talent-matching workflows — technically ambitious, fast-paced, and high-impact work at the intersection of AI and HR tech.
What You'll Do- Own end-to-end product features across the full stack, from architecture and data modeling through to frontend delivery
- Ship production code daily in a tight founding-team environment
- Design and consume REST APIs; build and maintain backend services with Node.js
- Model and manage data using PostgreSQL and Supabase
- Build scalable, responsive user interfaces with React
- Integrate AI/ML capabilities using providers such as OpenAI or Anthropic Claude to power agentic workflows
- Collaborate closely with the CTO and founding engineers to shape product direction and technical decisions
Required:
- Proficiency in full-stack development with TypeScript / JavaScript and Python
- Backend experience with Node.js and designing/consuming REST APIs
- Hands-on experience with PostgreSQL and Supabase for data modeling and storage
- Frontend experience with React to build scalable user interfaces
- Experience integrating AI/ML features using LLM providers (e.g. OpenAI, Claude)
- Proven ability to own and ship features end-to-end in a fast-moving startup environment
- Strong communication and cross-functional collaboration skills
- Willingness to work on-site in San Francisco (hackerhouse or commute as needed)
Nice to Have:
- 2–10 years of relevant engineering experience
- Prior experience at an early-stage or founding-team startup
- Familiarity with agentic AI architectures or workflow automation systems
- Salary: $140,000 – $180,000 USD annually
- Early-stage equity (founding team package)
- Visa sponsorship available
This is a fully on-site role based in San Francisco, CA . The team works out of a shared hackerhouse setup — ideal for candidates who thrive in a close-knit, in-person founding environment.
Vacancy posted 3 days ago
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