Engineering Lead - AI Product Development

WHO WE’RE LOOKING FOR:

Soulmates.ai is an AI-powered marketing platform backed by Ayzenberg Group, one of the largest, privately held advertising and media companies on the West Coast.

We're looking for an Engineering Lead to manage and mentor a team of 6 early-career engineers building production AI applications.

This is a player-coach role - you'll split your time between team leadership (60%) and hands-on coding (40%). Reporting to the SVP of Engineering, you'll help shape the technical direction while growing as a people manager.

This role is perfect for:

• Senior IC's who want to transition into management
• Tech leads who want more people management responsibility
• Engineers on the IC-to-EM career path who are ready to lead a team building exciting AI products (without the startup chaos)

The day-to-day:

Team Leadership & Management (~60%)

• Manage a team of 6 engineers: Daily standups, sprint planning, task assignments
• Code reviews: Review 10-15 PRs/week (we use Code Rabbit manual review)
• Mentor and develop: Pair programming, technical discussions, career development
• Set standards: Establish engineering practices, code quality, team culture
• Coordinate: Work with SVP Engineering on roadmap and priorities
• Build management skills: Learn to handle performance issues, hiring, team dynamics

Technical Contributions (~40%)

• Architect and ship features: Own 1-2 features per sprint
• Technical decisions: Multi-tenant architecture, authentication, RAG pipelines
• Debug production: OAuth flows, GCP infrastructure, database issues
• Lead by example: Modern AI-assisted development (Claude Code, Cursor)
• Strategic collaboration: Work closely with CEO and SVP on product direction

What This Role Is NOT

• Pure IC work; you're leading 6 people, not just coding
• Pure management ; you'll code regularly (40% of time)
• An ML role; product engineering, not training models
• Remote; the team is in our Pasadena office 3 days/week

Perfect If You're:

• A senior IC wanting to move into management
• A Tech Lead ready for more people responsibility
• A strong engineer who's mentored others (formally or informally)
• Ambitious and want to grow your leadership skills

What Success Looks Like:

You're excited about building AI-powered tools that transform how marketers work. You appreciate modern development approaches and aren't stuck in "the way things have always been done." You can provide technical leadership while respecting that product and technology decisions are collaborative. You thrive in a fast-paced environment where we ship often and iterate based on real user feedback.

WHAT WE'LL (FOR SURE) BRING TO THE TABLE:

• A competitive salary and great benefits package, including full medical, dental, and vision
• A matching 401(k)
• Paid maternity/paternity leave
• Pet insurance
• Monthly wellness benefits (to spend however you like on your own well-being!)
• Annual education credit (for anything from Masterclass, to LinkedIn certifications, to a cooking or tango class—have fun with it!)
• Unlimited PTO and paid holidays
• A supportive, fun, and respectful team environment
• The opportunity to work with cutting-edge AI technologies
• A hybrid model (in-office Tuesday - Thursday each week)

WHAT YOU'LL (IDEALLY) BRING TO THE TABLE:

• 5-7 years software engineering building production SaaS
• Some leadership experience: Tech lead, mentored engineers, led projects, or managed 1-3 people (formal or informal)
• You WANT to manage: Ready to transition from IC to leadership
• Strong technical skills:
• Python, FastAPI, REST APIs
• React, TypeScript, modern web frameworks
• MongoDB, Redis, authentication
• GCP/AWS, cloud infrastructure
• Mentorship experience: You've helped others level up
• Located in LA or willing to relocate
• High energy, organized, good communicator

Bonus Points:

• Experience using modern AI tools (Claude Code, Cursor, Copilot)
• LLM/RAG systems in production
• React Router, TailwindCSS, Stytch, GCP
• Spec-driven development

Our Stack:

• Backend: FastAPI, Python, MongoDB, Redis
• Frontend: React Router 7, TailwindCSS, shadcn/ui
• Auth: Stytch
• Infrastructure: GCP (Cloud Run, Cloud Storage)
• AI: OpenAI, Anthropic Claude, RAG pipelines
• Tools: Claude Code, Code Rabbit, spec-driven development

So, if you've read this far and have that butterflies-in-your-stomach feeling, please apply -- we'd love to hear from you!