Tech Lead Manager - AI Engineering Team

Join the fastest-growing startup in history — and lead a high-performing engineering team building the core systems that power the world’s leading AI labs.

Role Title: Tech Lead Manager

Location: Onsite in San Francisco, CA (Mon-Fri onsite and Saturday remote)

Client: Mercor (Unicorn, Series B at $2B)

Salary: $180,000 – $500,000 base + performance bonus + equity options

About Mercor:

• Mercor is revolutionizing how AI models are trained — powering data and infrastructure for the top 5 AI labs globally.
• The company scaled from $1M → $500M in revenue run rate in just 17 months, becoming the fastest-growing startup in history. Already valued at $2B+, Mercor remains profitable and accelerating with double-digit week-over-week growth.
• Now, they’re building one of Silicon Valley’s most ambitious engineering orgs — and hiring builder-leaders ready to shape the future of AI.

What You’ll Do:

• Split your time 50% hands-on coding and 50% engineering leadership.
• Write, ship, and review high-quality production code across backend systems (Python/Django or similar).
• Lead technical design, architecture, and system scalability across teams.
• Mentor and grow a distributed team of high-performing engineers.
• Hire rapidly across geographies and build lightweight, high-velocity processes.
• Collaborate cross-functionally with Product, Ops, and Data to deliver business-critical outcomes.
• Translate technical strategy into measurable business impact.
• Build evaluation frameworks and reinforcement learning environments powering AI training.

Ideal Experience:

• 6+ years in software engineering, including team leadership and IC-level contributions.
• Strong backend experience (Python/Django or similar).
• Proven record of shipping in production and scaling teams in high-growth settings.
• Background in startups or hypergrowth companies preferred.
• Familiarity with LLM internals, fine-tuning, or evaluation frameworks is a plus.
• Excellent communicator — able to explain technical trade-offs in business terms.
• Thrives in chaos, brings structure without bureaucracy.

Compensation & Perks

• $180,000 – $400,000 base + performance bonus + equity (depending on level)
• Full healthcare coverage + unlimited PTO
• $20K relocation bonus + housing stipend (if moving to SF HQ)
• Free Equinox membership + $1K/month meal stipend
• Office perks + career acceleration in a hypergrowth startup

This is your chance to step into a leadership role at a unicorn startup with world-class founders, top-tier investors, and an environment built for rapid career acceleration.