Founding Engineering Lead
Clera · New York, New York
Posted Oct 9, 2026 · Verified open Oct 9, 2026
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ABOUT THE ROLE
Lead engineering for an early-stage SaaS team building applied AI products for enterprise software. You will partner with the technical leadership team on architecture, product direction, and machine learning strategy while leading a small engineering pod and remaining hands-on with critical work.
WHAT YOU'LL DO
- Build and lead a pod of three to four engineers, supporting their growth, performance, and hiring while shipping key work yourself.
- Own platform architecture and make build-versus-buy and infrastructure decisions with product and revenue impact.
- Set engineering standards for AI-assisted development, including review criteria, definition of done, release cadence, and on-call practices.
- Lead technical designs and initial implementations for new initiatives.
- Evaluate applied ML research and determine which techniques are suitable for production systems.
- Partner with technical leadership to shape the product roadmap, model strategy, and ML approach.
- Initially spend most of your time building, with the balance focused on team leadership.
WHAT WE'RE LOOKING FOR
- Typically 5 to 8 years of engineering experience, with 4 to 5 years considered for exceptional candidates.
- Experience training and deploying machine learning models in production, beyond integrating LLM APIs.
- End-to-end ownership of technical architecture, infrastructure decisions, and build-versus-buy tradeoffs.
- Experience setting engineering standards and leading or managing engineers while continuing to code.
- Strong applied ML judgment across classical methods and newer approaches, including transformers and agent applications.
- Recent experience personally shipping production software, comfort with ambiguity and inherited code, and effective use of AI coding agents.
COMPENSATION & BENEFITS
Annual salary range: $200,000 to $400,000 USD. Visa sponsorship is not available.
LOCATION
On-site in New York City, United States.