Product Engineering Lead

Sesame HR; San Francisco (CA); On-site; USD 210,000 - 320,000; Full time

Benefits offered by this job

401(k) match

Health, vision, dental benefits

Unlimited PTO and sick time

FSA

EAP

Stock options

Job summary

Sesame is building the most human interface for intelligence, and we seek an engineering leader to guide a team of engineers to remarkable outcomes. You will drive product engineering, stay hands-on, and ensure the quality, reliability, and security of software that serves millions of users.

You’ll set technical direction, mentor engineers, and collaborate closely with product and design. This is a full-time role in San Francisco with strong growth and stock options.

Qualifications

• 10+ years as a software engineer, including 5+ years leading a team of 5+ engineers.
• Full-stack product engineer with depth in scalable web infrastructure and distributed systems.
• Strong product taste and the ability to ship impactful software from zero to one.
• Focus on secure, reliable, and well-crafted software with production-ready quality.

Responsibilities

• Drive the team outcomes and ship products people love.
• Stay hands-on: prototyping, bug fixes, de-risking, and tooling improvements.
• Own the quality bar: reliability, security, performance, and polish for end-to-end software.
• Grow engineers: provide actionable feedback and high performance standards.
• Partner with product and design to set direction and architecture.

Skills

Engineering leadership

Full-stack engineering

Distributed systems

Product sense

Mentorship

Security & reliability

Tools

Python

TypeScript

GCP

Kubernetes

Job description

About Sesame

Sesame believes in a future where computers are lifelike - with the ability to see, hear, and collaborate with us in ways that feel natural and human. With this vision, we're designing a new kind of computer, focused on making voice agents part of our daily lives. Our team brings together founders from Oculus and Ubiquity6, alongside proven leaders from Meta, Google, and Apple, with deep expertise spanning hardware and software. Join us in shaping a future where computers truly come alive.

About the Role

Sesame is an interface company. We're building the most human interface for intelligence. Our personal agents, like Maya, hold natural conversations and make the devices they run on more useful. We're looking for someone to lead this team.

A word on how we think about management here. You're not there to track progress or supervise employees. You're an engineering leader: someone who guides a team of engineers to incredible outcomes, chosen to lead because of consistent displays of great judgment. People leadership is a crucial part of that, and you treat it as essential to what makes you great, not the boring work someone has to do.

Responsibilities:

• Drive the team's outcomes. Lead product engineering to ship products people love. You're accountable for results, not just execution.
• Stay hands-on. You're continuously prototyping, fixing bugs, de-risking projects, and improving quality of life for the team. You plug into the work and show the team how to get more out of the tools available to engineers today.
• Be responsible for the quality bar for products serving millions of people: reliability, security, performance, and polish. Your team owns its software end-to-end, including deployment, reliability, and production operations.
• Grow the engineers on your team. Give clear, actionable feedback, create opportunities for people to do the best work of their careers, and hold a high bar for performance.
• Build a talented, diverse engineering team by attracting and hiring exceptional engineers.
• Partner closely with product and design. We have skilled product designers; you don't need to be the primary product visionary, but you need real judgment about what makes a product people love.
• Set technical direction for the product stack and make the architectural calls that keep it simple, reliable, and fast to build on.

Required Qualifications:

• You've managed engineers and led teams through complex projects to outcomes you're proud of. We care about the track record, not the title.
• 10+ years as a software engineer, including 5+ years managing a team of 5+ engineers.
• You're a full-stack product engineer with real depth in scalable web infrastructure. You've built products on distributed systems serving millions of people and understand the reliability engineering that takes.
• Product taste: a keen sense for what makes a product feel great.
• You're a software engineer at heart. You'll sit on the software engineering team, and you care as much about secure, reliable, well-crafted software as you do about delightful products.
• You've personally built and shipped a product zero to one, or been a core engineer on a transformative project at a bigger company, the kind that set the direction for the whole industry.

Preferred Qualifications:

• You've built products centered on AI and have hard-won intuition for what makes them work.
• Consumer hardware product experience, building the software side of a physical product.
• Experience with Python, TypeScript, GCP, and Kubernetes.

Sesame is committed to a workplace where everyone feels valued, respected, and empowered. We welcome all qualified applicants, embracing diversity in race, gender, identity, orientation, ability, and more. We provide reasonable accommodations for applicants with disabilities. Contact [e-mail] for assistance.

Full-time Employee Benefits:

• 401 (k) max employer match: 3.5% of compensation
• 100% employer-paid health, vision, and dental benefits for you and your dependents
• Unlimited PTO and sick time
• Flexible spending account with employer matching up to $1,650/year (medical FSA)
• Guardian Employee Assistance Program (EAP)
• Opportunity to share in the company's success with competitive stock options

Benefits do not apply to contingent/contract workers.