Engineering Fellowship

10a Labs; San Francisco (CA); On-site; USD 80,000 - 120,000; Full time

Job summary

A pioneering AI technology company in San Francisco is seeking an Engineering Fellow to apply technical skills in high-impact research. This role requires collaboration across diverse project stages, focusing on software engineering, data engineering, or machine learning concentrations. Ideal candidates will have a strong academic background and experience in Python, with a passion for innovation in AI safety and security. The position emphasizes creativity and the ability to communicate effectively in interdisciplinary settings.

Qualifications

• Strong academic background and quantitative foundation demonstrated through applied coursework, research, or hands-on experience.
• Experience with Python programming.
• Ability to communicate technical concepts to non-technical audiences.

Responsibilities

• Collaborate with engineers on real projects, including client-facing products and in-house tooling.
• Assist with researching experiment design, particularly for AI systems.
• Support critical initiatives related to Trust & Safety and AI Security.

Skills

Python

Communication of technical concepts

Collaboration

Curiosity and creativity

Education

Strong academic background

Tools

Google Cloud Platform

Job description

About 10a Labs

10a Labs is the safety and threat-intelligence layer trusted by frontier AI labs, AI unicorns, Fortune 10 companies, and leading global technology platforms. Our adversarial red teaming, model evaluations, and intelligence collection enable engineering, safety, and security teams to stay ahead of evolving threats and deploy AI systems safely.

About the role

As an Engineering Fellow, you will apply your technical skills to support high-impact research problems. Fellows will contribute across the project lifecycle — from processing diverse data sources and designing dynamic visualizations, to deploying sophisticated models and building cloud infrastructure. This is a hands-on role at the intersection of applied research and practical engineering, with opportunities to explore novel methods, test ideas quickly, and generate insights.

Fellows specialize in one of three concentrations based on interest and past experience: Software Engineering, Data Engineering, or Machine Learning.

In this role, you will

• Collaborate with engineers on real projects, including client-facing products and in-house tooling;
• Assist with researching experiment design and automation, particularly as it relates to abuse detection or red teaming of AI systems;
• Ideate / brainstorm new research approaches to known and novel problems in the Trust & Safety and AI Security fields; and
• Support other critical initiatives.

Software Engineering concentration responsibilities

• Implementing cloud infrastructure for deploying machine learning models;
• Writing high-coverage test suites for complex codebases; and
• Guiding project development with software engineering best practices, including version control, continuous integration, and design patterns.

Data Engineering concentration responsibilities

• Sourcing, curating, and processing diverse data sources across domains and modalities, including automated collection of internet-scale datasets;
• Designing data architecture schemata, implementing with production-grade data storage tools, and interfacing via custom APIs; and
• Developing front-end dashboards and other visualizations.

Machine Learning concentration responsibilities

• Training, validating, evaluating, and deploying cutting-edge machine learning algorithms including classifiers, LLMs, and computer vision models;
• Building agentic systems for automated prompting, red-teaming, research, and rapid experimentation;
• Supporting projects with specialized knowledge of frontier model architectures and cutting-edge technology.

We’re looking for someone who

• Brings curiosity and creativity to ambiguous research problems, with a bias toward experimentation and rapid iteration;
• Thrives in collaborative, interdisciplinary environments; is resourceful, proactive, and adaptable;
• Is comfortable communicating technical ideas clearly to both technical and non-technical audiences; and
• Is excited about contributing to real-world applications and exploring new methods that push beyond standard benchmarks.

Requirements

• Strong academic background and quantitative foundation demonstrated through applied coursework, research, or hands-on-experience
• Strong Python background
• Clear communicator of technical concepts for non-technical audiences

Nice to have

• Familiarity with Google Cloud Platform (or similar), including storage and database services (e.g., Cloud Storage, CloudSQL, Cloud Spanner), workflow orchestration (e.g., Cloud Composer/Airflow, Cloud Run, Pub/Sub), and ML services (e.g., Vertex AI, Compute Engine)
• Experience managing full lifecycle projects from design to deployment