Lead Engineer, Internal Tools & Business Systems

Aquaria; United States; Hybrid; USD 130,000 - 180,000; Full time

Benefits offered by this job

Equity

Health insurance

Unlimited PTO

Job summary

Aquaria is building machines that turn air into clean drinking water. We’re seeking a technical lead to own internal tools, integrations, data flows, and the developers who build them.

You’ll partner with sales, operations, and customer success to shape the roadmap and drive adoption of the tools that run the business. You’ll ship with AI-enabled development, own identity and access across software, and guide build-versus-buy decisions.

Qualifications

• Shipping production software as primary engineer on recent projects.
• Experience leading engineers, including contractors, and owning outcomes.
• Hands-on use of AI-assisted development daily.
• Experience building integrations with third-party APIs and data pipelines with data quality checks.
• Comfort with relational databases and writing queries to debug data issues.
• Experience migrating data from spreadsheets/legacy tools into a system of record.
• Experience with access management and security practices for production systems.
• Experience deploying, monitoring, and recovering production systems without data loss.
• Strong written communication and collaboration with non-technical stakeholders.

Responsibilities

• Partner with sales, operations, customer success, and RevOps to set priorities and craft a roadmap.
• Build and maintain internal tools used daily by teams.
• Develop integrations and data pipelines connecting SaaS tools; ensure data accuracy.
• Establish a single source of truth for core business data (customers, deals, installations, payments).
• Lead the development team: scope work, unblock, review code, and oversee releases.
• Make build-versus-buy decisions and manage SaaS vendors/consultants.
• Own identity and access management across company software; onboard/offboard users.
• Provide secure, governed access to data for teams and AI tools.
• Set up monitoring/alerting for pipelines; lead incident response.
• Write and maintain runbooks and documentation for owned systems.
• Set realistic timelines, deliver, and flag risks early.

Skills

Production software

People leadership

AI-assisted coding

APIs & data pipelines

Databases & queries

Data migration

Security & IAM

Monitoring & incident response

Clear written comms

Tools

Supabase

BigQuery

Fivetran

HubSpot

Aircall

Salesmsg

Docusign

CompanyCam

Job description

The Role

Aquaria's sales, operations, and customer success teams run on internal tools we build in-house, connected to the SaaS platforms they use every day. We're hiring a technical lead to own them: the tools, the integrations behind them, the data that flows through them, and the developers who build them.

You'll partner with leaders across the company to decide what to build, write code every week, and be accountable for whether these systems actually help the business run.

About Aquaria

Aquaria builds machines that make clean drinking water from air. Our mission is to safeguard and unlock a sustainable future for clean water. We're backed by investors including Mistletoe, Soma Capital, Bow Capital, Ciri Ventures, HF0, and former House Majority Leader Dick Gephardt. Our technology was selected among TIME's Best Inventions of 2024 and received an Honorable Mention for Developing-World Technology in Fast Company's 2023 World Changing Ideas Awards. Learn more at www.aquaria.world.

What You'll Do

• Partner with sales, operations, customer success, and RevOps to set priorities and turn their needs into a clear roadmap
• Build and maintain the internal tools these teams rely on every day, and drive adoption so the tools become how the work gets done
• Build and maintain the integrations and data pipelines that connect our SaaS tools, such as our CRM, phone, e-signature, and field service apps, and keep that data accurate and in sync
• Establish a single source of truth for core business data, such as customers, deals, installations, and payments
• Lead the developers on your team: scope the work, keep them unblocked, review their code, and hold a high bar for what ships
• Make build-versus-buy decisions, and manage the SaaS vendors and consultants behind our stack
• Own identity and access management across the company's software, including onboarding, offboarding, and credential hygiene
• Give teams, and the AI tools they use, secure and governed access to company data
• Set up monitoring and alerting for our pipelines and tools, and lead the response when something breaks
• Write and maintain documentation and runbooks for the systems you own
• Set realistic timelines, deliver against them, and flag risks early

How We Work

Everyone at Aquaria, from the founders to our field technicians, uses AI in their daily work. This team builds with AI coding tools, so you should know where they speed you up and where their output needs a closer review.

We bias toward shipping: get a working version in front of users early, then iterate. Most weeks keep regular hours, and when a system the team depends on goes down, we fix it the same day.

Much of our communication is written and asynchronous. Remote candidates need working hours that overlap with US Central time.

Requirements

What You Bring

• A track record of shipping production software that others relied on, as the primary engineer, including work from the past year
• Experience leading other engineers, including contractors: scoping work, reviewing code, and owning the result
• Daily, hands‑on use of AI-assisted development
• Experience building integrations with third‑party APIs, and data pipelines with data quality checks
• Comfort with relational databases, including writing queries to debug data issues across connected systems
• Experience migrating data from spreadsheets and legacy tools into a system of record
• Experience with access management and security practices for production systems
• Experience deploying, monitoring, and recovering production systems without data loss
• Strong written communication, and a track record of working with non‑technical stakeholders and vendors

You May Be a Good Fit If You

• Prefer shipping a working version this week to a perfect one next month
• Turn ambiguous requests into a plan, a scope, and a date
• Notice problems before anyone reports them, and fix the root cause

Bonus Points

Experience with any of the platforms we use:

• Data: Supabase, BigQuery, Fivetran
• Sales and Communication: HubSpot, Aircall, Salesmsg
• Operations and Field: Docusign, CompanyCam

Our Values

• Challenge the Status Quo: Question assumptions. Fix broken systems. Principles > rules.
• Move Fast: Focus on what matters, act quickly, and learn by doing.
• Give & Get Feedback: Be direct, be humble. Challenge ideas, including your own.
• Own the Outcome: Take full responsibility. Deliver results. No excuses.
• Act Like an Owner: Be resourceful, mindful of impact, and committed to the business.
• Be Decisive: Drive clarity. Make bold calls with imperfect info.
• Bring the Intensity: We're building something hard, and it takes real commitment.

Benefits

• Equity
• Health, dental, and vision insurance
• Unlimited PTO