Staff, Applied AI Engineer

About the company

Headstart is built for people who want to think like founders. We work inside real enterprises ($100M+ ARR) shipping production AI systems that change how they operate. Every engagement is a different industry, a different problem, and a different set of constraints. You leave each one knowing that business deeply.

We've built our own agent Friday, which powers the majority of how we deliver. We're bootstrapped, cash-flow positive, and growing fast.

Why join us

The engineers who thrive at Headstart are the ones who want to understand how businesses work, not just how code works. We work inside real enterprises, shipping production AI systems that change how they operate. We take the work seriously and the culture deliberately. Pay is transparent, weekends are yours, and we don't confuse long hours with good work.

About the role

• Lead and own multiple client engagements end-to-end, from ideation and technical discovery through to production
• Prototype rapidly while ensuring long-term reliability, maintainability, and security
• Balance multiple concurrent engagements, context-switching between different technical stacks and business domains
• Contribute to the Headstart Platform roadmap by identifying and delivering the highest-leverage investments across our tooling and infrastructure
• Shape client strategy by reframing problems, influencing priorities, and defining what the right path forward looks like
• Be the technical authority in sales and scoping conversations
• Grow the engineers around you and raise the floor of every project you work on

Your background

• 7+ years of professional software engineering experience with a track record of owning complex, high-stakes systems end-to-end
• Been the technical authority in rooms with executives and clients and have shaped what got built, not just built what you were told
• Experience creatively applying AI in the development lifecycle, and knowing when not to
• Enjoys a fast-paced and collaborative environment
• Have owned client relationships at the executive level: running discovery, navigating difficult conversations, and earning trust quickly
• Proven full-stack depth: backend services (Python), datastores, React/Next.js, optionally ML
• Experience designing distributed systems, APIs, data pipelines, or developer productivity infrastructure at scale
• Bonus if you’ve been a founding engineer or startup early hire, with history building production products from scratch

Bonus if you’re NYC based — we have a loft office in Soho and provide lunch and snacks

What to expect

• Initial screen (30 min): a conversation with our recruiting partner about your background, what you're looking for, and how we work.
• Technical screen (30 min): a short, real-world coding exercise with an engineer from our team.
• Hiring manager interview (45 min): behavioral and past work with a member of the team
• Technical interviews (2.5 hrs total, split across two sessions): a coding interview and a systems design interview. You're encouraged to use AI tools in the coding interview; it reflects how we work day to day.
• Project deep dive (1 hr): for Staff candidates only. A conversation with a fellow engineer about something significant you've built.

Note

Even if you don't meet all the requirements, we still encourage you to apply. This role offers extensive benefits, a base salary of $265,000 USD plus competitive equity compensation, 401k with employer match, fully covered medical, dental, and vision premiums, monthly wellness stipend, free lunch everyday in our NYC office, Citi Bike + pre-tax commuter benefits, and 12 weeks parental leave with an optional 4-week ramp-up at a 50% schedule.

While this position is listed as hybrid in NYC or Toronto, we are open to considering fully remote candidates based in the US or Canada for the right fit.