Director of Engineering

Forum-Ventures; Austin (TX); On-site; USD 180,000 - 240,000; Full time

Job summary

Outlast is hiring a Director of Engineering to own engineering execution, ensuring scalable core platform, AI-driven automation, and AI-native product delivery. The role blends technical leadership with hands-on guidance of a small, high-output team, shaping how finance, operations, and sales workflows are automated and integrated with customers.

The candidate will lead the engineering operating system, maintain data integrity under growth, and drive AI-enabled capabilities across the business,

Qualifications

• Built systems intersecting finance, operations and commercial data.
• Shipped AI and agent-powered systems in production, not demos.
• Expertise with LLMs, agents, evals, latency and cost trade-offs.
• Track record delivering products that non-technical customers actually adopt.

Responsibilities

• Scale the core platform to handle high volume while keeping data trustworthy.
• Move operations onto the platform and automate workflows with AI-enabled tooling.
• Build customer-facing products and integrations embedding the platform for suppliers and buyers.
• Direct AI-native development; set standards for AI-written code and reliability.
• Lead a small, shipping engineering team and establish delivery cadences and reliability standards.

Skills

Enterprise systems

AI in production

AI-native development

Non-technical product adoption

Early-stage leadership

Job description

Outlast is building the digital infrastructure for the global recyclables industry. We are partnering with major market participants to modernize how materials are traded, financed, and moved through supply chains.

The company has already secured some of the largest commercial contracts in the industry and is growing 3-4x year-over-year while maintaining strong capital efficiency.

We are hiring a Director of Engineering to lead the next phase of the platform: scaling the core systems the business runs on and building the AI-enabled products that embed Outlast deeper into how the industry operates.

About Outlast

Outlast is modernizing one of the largest markets in the world.

The global recyclables industry represents a $1 trillion market that has historically operated with limited technology infrastructure. Outlast is building the digital platform that connects suppliers, buyers, and logistics into a unified ecosystem.

Our platform enables market participants to transact materials seamlessly while providing integrated services including logistics coordination, financing, and quality control, creating a full-stack solution for the recyclables supply chain.

In a short periodof time, Outlast has secured some of the largest commercial contracts in the recyclables industry, validating both the scale of the opportunity and the strength of the platform we are building.

The company is currently growing 3-4x year-over-year, a pace that exceeds traditional venture-backed benchmarks, while maintaining a disciplined approach to capital efficiency. Rather than relying on heavy capital burn, Outlast has focused on building a business with strong unit economics and operational leverage from the outset.

As we continue to scale, our focus remains on building technology and systems that allow the business to grow rapidly while operating with increasing efficiency.

The Role

The Director of Engineering will own engineering execution at Outlast.

That means the integrity and scalability of the core platform, the internal tooling that operations, finance, and sales run on, the AI and agent automation that removes manual work from workflows, and the customer-facing products and integrations that embed Outlast with its suppliers and buyers.

This role owns the seams where finance, operations, and commercial systems meet technology: inventory, reconciliation, ledgers, procurement and fulfillment workflows, pricing data, and the integrity that ties them together.

Outlast builds in an AI-native environment where AI writes most of the code. The job is to architect, direct, and review AI-generated systems, not to hand-author them, and to lead a small, high-output engineering team as a player-coach.

The role is based in Salt Lake City, working in person alongside the team and the business, with occasional travel to customers and sites to understand operator workflows firsthand.

Key Responsibilities

Scale the Core Platform

• Harden and extend the systems where finance, operations, and commercial data intersect: inventory, reconciliation, ledgers, procurement and fulfillment workflows, and pricing data
• Carry platform volume 4x year over year while keeping the data trustworthy
• Identify where systems strain under volume and ship improvements, making the platform the single source of truth for the business

Move Operations onto the Platform and Automate It

• Ship the internal tooling that trading, logistics, finance, and sales teams rely on every day, so the company scales volume without adding headcount
• Replace manual spreadsheets with real platform capabilities, then automate them with agentic workflows that measurably remove human time or improve unit economics
• Own AI observability and cost, including per-feature spend tracking and model selection trade-offs

Build Customer-Facing Products and Integrations

• Build the products and integrations that embed Outlast into how suppliers and buyers already operate
• Decide per case whether an agentic flow or an embedded platform experience serves the customer best
• Measure success by effort removed and time saved for the customer, not features shipped

Direct AI-Native Development

• Architect, direct, and review AI-generated systems; AI writes most of the code at Outlast
• Stand up the practices that keep AI-written code correct and maintainable: code review, evals for AI features, deploy discipline, and reliability
• Set the standard for how a small team ships enterprise-grade systems with AI leverage

Lead and Level Up the Engineering Team

• Lead a small, actively shipping engineering team as a player-coach, and grow it deliberately as the work demands
• Establish the engineering operating system: delivery cadence, review practices, and reliability standards
• Be the engineering partner the rest of the company relies on, translating the workflows operations, finance, and sales struggle with into shipped automation

Qualifications

Enterprise Systems Depth

• Has built systems where finance, operations, and commercial data intersect: inventory, reconciliation, ledgers, procurement and fulfillment workflows, pricing data
• Can describe a system they built across these domains, how it scaled, and what it took to keep the data trustworthy as volume grew

AI and Agentic Systems in Production

• Has personally shipped AI and agent-powered systems in production, not proofs of concept or demos
• Understands LLM and agent architecture, evals, latency, and cost trade-offs

AI-Native Development Fluency

• Builds primarily by orchestrating AI coding tools: architecting, prompting, reviewing, and shipping AI-written code
• Can describe how AI changed how their team ships and how they keep AI-generated code correct and maintainable

Builds for Non-Technical Customers

• Track record of building products that non-technical customers actually adopt
• Integrates products into how customers already work, measuring success by effort removed and time saved

Early-Stage Operating Style

• Has been the first or most senior engineering leader at a small company, comfortable doing the work without a platform, QA, or data team behind them
• Ships working systems, owns data correctness as the business scales, and is honest about strengths and gaps
• Based in or willing to relocate to Salt Lake City, working in person with the team

Experience with data warehousing and pipelines, accounting or ERP integration, or supply chain, industrial, and marketplace businesses is a strong plus.

Why Join Outlast

Outlast sits at the intersection of technology, global supply chains, and sustainability, with the opportunity to modernize an industry that has historically lacked digital infrastructure.

In this role, you will have the opportunity to:

• Help build the technology platform powering a $1T global market
• Own engineering at a profitable, capital-efficient company growing 3-4x year-over-year
• Build in a truly AI-native environment where AI writes most of the code and your leverage comes from directing it
• Work directly with customers across the recyclables ecosystem and ship systems they use every day
• Work directly with the CEO and shape how a global industry runs

For the right builder, this is an opportunity to ship systems that deliver real economic value while helping define the technological foundation of a large and evolving industry.