Head of Software Engineering @ Stealth Startup

About the role

This is a player-coach role at a critical moment. You'll manage and scale a high-performing team while staying close to the work — setting engineering standards, unblocking execution, and ensuring we ship fast without accumulating debt that slows us down later.

What You'll Do

• Lead, grow, and retain a world-class software engineering team across consumer software and AI
• Own engineering execution — sprint planning, resourcing, delivery, and team health
• Set and enforce engineering standards: code quality, architecture patterns, review culture, and on-call practices
• Partner with product and design to scope work, surface tradeoffs, and hit milestones
• Recruit aggressively — you'll be a key part of building the team around you
• Serve as the connective tissue between individual engineers and company leadership

Requirements

• 8+ years in software engineering, with 3+ years managing engineering teams
• Deep experience shipping consumer-facing software — you know what a polished, high-quality product takes
• Fluent in AI/ML-integrated systems — you've worked on products where models are core to the experience, not a bolt-on
• Strong people manager: you develop engineers, give direct feedback, and build team culture
• Execution-oriented — you keep things moving, resolve ambiguity, and protect the team from noise
• Techically credible enough to earn respect from strong engineers without needing to be in every design decision