Principal Engineer / VP of Engineering

Foreplay; United States; Remote; USD 180,000 - 230,000; Full time

Job summary

Foreplay is seeking a hands-on Lead Engineer to guide a small distributed system team while also coding and shaping how the organization plans, builds, and operates software. You will split time between contributing code and mentoring four engineers, with ambitions to grow toward seven or eight as the system expands.

You will partner with product leadership to align technical initiatives with delivery priorities, maintain clear operational ownership, and manage releases.

Qualifications

• Balance hands-on engineering with team and system leadership.
• Experience owning distributed software systems.
• Ability to grow an engineering team and improve delivery.

Responsibilities

• Contribute to codebase while setting technical direction and delivery.
• Own an event-driven distributed system and guide its development.
• Grow the engineering team from four engineers toward seven or eight.
• Establish engineering practices that enable reliable delivery as the team grows.
• Work with product and management leadership to align technical decisions with product priorities.
• Maintain clear operational ownership and manage releases.

Skills

Hands-on coding

Distributed systems

Team leadership

Product alignment

Release management

Job description

Role overview

Lead engineering as a hands‑on player‑coach, dividing time between writing code and improving how the engineering organization plans, builds, and operates software. The role takes responsibility for an existing distributed system and grows a small engineering team, while working with product leadership on direction and delivery priorities.

Responsibilities

• Contribute directly to the codebase while setting technical direction and deciding how work should be delivered.
• Take ownership of an existing event‑driven distributed system and guide its continued development.
• Grow the engineering team from four engineers, alongside contractors, toward a team of roughly seven or eight.
• Establish effective engineering practices that help the team deliver reliably as it grows.
• Work with product and general management leadership to align technical decisions with product direction and priorities.
• Maintain clear operational ownership, including the ability to understand and recover systems and manage releases.

Requirements

• Willingness and ability to balance hands‑on engineering with team and system leadership.
• Experience taking responsibility for distributed software systems.
• Ability to grow an engineering team while improving its delivery capacity and reducing reliance on individual heroics.
• Sound judgment and accountability when reviewing and shipping code produced with AI assistance.
• Availability to work with some overlap with Eastern Time.

Benefits and work setup

The position is fully remote and open to candidates worldwide, with Eastern Time overlap. The engineering group currently includes four engineers and contractors. The role reports to product and general management leadership, with product direction and delivery cadence handled in partnership.