Founders Initiatives, Technical Ex-Founders

ABOUT RETELL AI

Retell AI is using first principles to reimagine the call center with cutting-edge voice AI.

Thousands of companies now utilize Retell's AI voice agents to handle sales, support, and logistics calls that once required large teams of human agents. Backed by Y Combinator, Alt Capital, and other leading investors, we have scaled rapidly to tens of millions in ARR with a small, high-velocity team.

Our vision is to build a modern customer experience platform where AI agents operate as frontline workers, QA systems, and operational managers-continuously executing, monitoring, and improving customer interactions.

We're looking for builders who want to work on the hardest problems in applied AI, move fast, and have outsized ownership in shaping the company.

ABOUT FOUNDERS INITIATIVES

Founders Initiatives is a cross-functional team that works directly with Retell's founders on the company's highest-priority opportunities and challenges. Team members are expected to operate across functions, build from first principles, and help scale the business in whatever way creates the most impact.

This is not a narrowly scoped role, it is a high-ownership builder position where you will work across product, engineering, GTM, operations, and AI systems to design and ship core company infrastructure.

ABOUT THE ROLE

We are hiring a Founders Initiatives, Technical Ex-Founders to design and implement internal and external AI systems that power how Retell hires, sells, operates, and scales.

You will be responsible for building production-grade AI workflows, automations, and agent systems that directly impact company operations and customer experience.

This role sits at the intersection of applied AI, full-stack engineering, and startup operations.

KEY RESPONSIBILITIES
HR & Recruiting AI Systems

• Build systems that extract structured signals from resumes (skills, experience, founder traits, domain expertise)
• Develop lead scoring models to predict interview success and role fit
• Design AI recruiter workflows for candidate screening and qualification
• Automate personalized outbound email and candidate engagement workflows

Security & Compliance Automation

• Build automation systems for customer security workflows (BAAs, DPAs, DocuSign, contract review flows)
• Automate security questionnaire and compliance response generation
• Improve internal tooling for enterprise readiness and audit processes

Operational Infrastructure Tools

• Build systems for accounts receivable automation and finance-related email workflows
• Create automated enterprise customer onboarding and account setup tools
• Design internal systems that reduce manual operational overhead across teams

3rd-Party Integrations & Platform Work

• Integrate with CRM systems such as Salesforce, HubSpot, and GoHighLevel
• Build workflow automation using tools like Zapier, n8n, and Make
• Design LLM-powered systems using OpenAI, Gemini, Claude, and other models
• Own API-based integrations that connect internal systems across the company

GTM Engineering & Growth Automation

• Build HubSpot and Lark automations to improve sales and marketing efficiency
• Develop lifecycle automation systems for customer engagement and retention
• Create targeted website personalization and ad content generation systems
• Build email personalization and outbound automation pipelines at scale

YOU MIGHT THRIVE IF YOU

• Have a Bachelor's degree in Computer Science, Computer Engineering, or a closely related technical field.
• Have 2+ years professional software engineering experience
• Have 1+ year of startup experience and are comfortable with ambiguity and fast iteration.
• Think like a founder and operate with high ownership
• Have strong software engineering skills (backend, full-stack, or systems)
• Have hands-on experience building with LLMs or AI agents in production
• Are comfortable working across product, engineering, and operations
• Move fast, iterate quickly, and are comfortable with ambiguity
• Prefer building systems over working on narrowly defined tasks
• Care deeply about real-world impact over theoretical work

JOB DETAILS

• Cash: 200k - 300k
• Equity : Offers Meaningful Equity
• Location : Redwood City, CA, US
• US Visas : Retell AI is open to sponsoring work authorization for qualified candidates, including H-1B, TN, L-1, E-3, F-1 (OPT/CPT), and O-1 visas.

OTHER BENEFITS

• 100% coverage for medical, dental, and vision insurance
• $70/day DoorDash credit for unlimited breakfast, lunch, dinner, and snacks
• $200/month wellness reimbursement (gym, fitness classes, etc.)
• $300/month commuter reimbursement (gas, Caltrain, etc.)
• $75/month phone bill reimbursement
• $50/month internet reimbursement

COMPENSATION PHILOSOPHY

• Best Offer Upfront: Choose from three cash-equity balance options; no negotiation needed.
• Top 1% Talent: Above-market pay (top 5 percentile) to attract exceptional builders.
• High Ownership: Small teams, >$1M revenue/employee, and significant equity.
• Performance-Based: Offers tied to interview performance, not experience or past salaries.

INTERVIEW PROCESS

1. Intro Call (15-20min) : Connect with our talent team to get a deeper look at the team and the work you'd be doing.
2. First Technical Phone Interview (45 min) : Practical coding session focused on code fluency and system design (For frontend roles, we will focus on React-specific questions)
3. Technical Phone Interview (45 min) : Practical coding session focused on code fluency and focused more heavily on your systems design approach
4. Onsite/Virtual Interviews (2-3 hrs) : Hosted in our office if located in the Bay Area or virtual, with three rounds:
   
   1. Practical Coding: Tackle real-world coding tasks with debugging.
   2. System Design: Architect a production-ready system.
   3. Tools & Automation: Build automations or improve workflows in any basic environment setup like python, java, node.js, etc.