Lead Engineer (Application Pod)

Parspec•San Mateo, CA

12h•Hybrid

About The Position

Parspec is building the AI and digital infrastructure for the construction materials supply chain. Construction is a $15 trillion industry, yet the systems that underpin the buying and selling of materials remain fragmented, manual, and disconnected. Distributors and rep agencies rely on spreadsheets, PDFs, phone calls, and siloed tools to find new products and quote and manage projects; creating delays, errors, and margin erosion across the supply chain. Parspec is an AI-native platform that powers how construction products are discovered, bought, and sold. Trusted by more than 300 MEP distributors and rep agencies, Parspec helps project-driven businesses bid faster, win more work, and operate more profitably. By combining product intelligence, AI-powered workflows, and a connected ecosystem, Parspec is laying the foundation for a more intelligent, efficient construction supply chain. Founded in 2021 and headquartered in San Mateo, California, Parspec has raised $31 million from leading deep-tech and construction-technology investors. The Opportunity We are rebuilding how an engineering team operates — smaller, faster, AI-augmented. We have proven the model works. Now we need someone to help us scale it. As Lead Engineer, you are not a manager. You are the strongest technical voice in the room. You set the architecture, define how we build, and hold the bar across every team. You will work with Claude Code as your primary tool and be the person who figures out how to get the most out of it — then teaches everyone else. This is a role for someone who has been a senior engineer for long enough to have real opinions, has led technical direction without needing a title to do it, and is ready to operate in an environment where the rules are being written as we go.

Requirements

8+ years of full-stack engineering experience, with depth in both backend and frontend systems.
Has led technical direction — not just contributed, but led. You have been the person who made architectural decisions, documented them, and lived with the consequences.
AI-first mindset — you are not experimenting with AI tools, you have integrated them deeply into how you build and have strong, experience-based opinions about their limits.
Can spot the problem behind the problem — when a PM brings you a requirement, you understand the user need, the data model implications, and the long-term maintenance cost at the same time.
Track record of raising team quality — engineers who have worked with you are better for it. You can point to specific things you changed.
Comfortable with ambiguity — this is a company where the engineering org is being built in real time. You help build it — you do not wait for it to be built.
Strong code review skills and judgment in evaluating code quality and readiness for production.

Nice To Haves

You have been a tech lead or staff engineer in a high-growth startup.
You have defined coding standards or architecture patterns that the team actually adopted.
You have a point of view on what makes AI-augmented development work at scale — and what breaks it.
You have mentored senior engineers, not just junior ones.
Experience working in teams of 2–5 engineers with high ownership and minimal hierarchy.

Responsibilities

Own cross-cutting technical decisions — database architecture, API design, service boundaries, performance at scale. You make them, document them, and defend them.
Drive the technical roadmap — working with the PMs, shape the engineering side of what we build and when, not just how.
Ship — you are still hands-on. You own the hardest problems and the most critical systems. You are not a gatekeeper — you are a builder who also leads.
Define how we build with AI — set the patterns for how engineers work with Claude Code: how to decompose problems, how to verify output, how to maintain quality at speed. Your approach becomes the team’s approach.
Manage development across git worktrees and parallel agent sessions.
Review, refine, and validate AI-generated code to ensure correctness, performance, and maintainability.
Continuously improve development workflows using AI tools like Claude Code, CodeRabbit, and automated pipelines.
Set the quality standard — you are the final word on code review, testing philosophy, and what “done” means. You establish the bar others are measured against.
Write and maintain high-quality tests (unit, integration, and E2E using Playwright) as a core part of development.
Ensure all features meet quality standards through automated testing, AI-assisted code review, and manual validation.
Elevate engineers around you — make senior engineers better by reviewing their architecture, challenging their assumptions, and giving feedback that sticks.
Review AI-generated and cross-functional PRs across the team.
Work with product and design to challenge assumptions, refine requirements, and improve solutions.
Define best practices for AI-assisted development, testing, and code review across the engineering organization.
Create and maintain CLAUDE.md files and development conventions that scale across the team.
Establish patterns for domain ownership, system design, and engineering workflows as the technical lead.