Head of Engineering

Serval • San Francisco, CA

1d • $250,000 - $400,000

About The Position

As Head of Engineering at Serval, you’ll lead the engineering organization and help shape the technical direction of our platform. You will be responsible for building and scaling a high-performing team, delivering a reliable and secure product, and partnering closely with the founding team to turn our roadmap into reality.

This is a senior leadership role with significant ownership. You will partner closely with our CTO and product leadership to define Serval’s engineering strategy, architecture direction, and execution plan.

Requirements

• 8+ years of software engineering experience, including experience leading teams as an engineering manager, tech lead, or engineering leader.
• Proven ability to build and scale engineering teams in a fast-moving environment.
• Strong technical foundation and architectural judgment, with hands-on experience shipping and operating production systems.
• Experience partnering cross-functionally and translating product goals into clear technical plans and execution.
• High standards for engineering excellence, including reliability, security, and developer velocity.
• Exceptional communication skills and a track record of leading through ambiguity.
• Degree in Computer Science or a related engineering field (or equivalent practical experience).

Nice To Haves

• Early-stage startup experience.
• Experience with some of the technologies in our stack: Go, GRPC, Kubernetes, React, Typescript, AWS, and Terraform.
• Experience building AI-enabled product features (even if not an AI/ML specialist role).

Responsibilities

• Lead, hire, and develop an exceptional engineering team. Create the structure, processes, and culture needed to scale.
• Own delivery of the engineering roadmap, ensuring projects ship on time with high quality and clear accountability.
• Set and uphold engineering best practices across code quality, testing, reliability, security, and incident response.
• Build strong cross-functional operating rhythms with Product, Design, and Go-To-Market teams to ensure excellent execution and a great user experience.
• Establish metrics and systems for engineering effectiveness (planning, estimation, on-call, retrospectives, technical debt management).
• Drive continuous improvement of our platform’s performance, scalability, and maintainability as usage grows.

Benefits

• Impact: Be a key player in shaping the success of our product and company.
• Growth: Build a fundamentally new AI product offering with the support of our experienced team and investors. Grow rapidly with the company.
• Culture: Join a culture that values innovation, ownership, accountability, and fun.

What This Job Offers

• Job Type: Full-time
• Career Level: Senior