Vice President, AI Product & Engineering

Remote; San Francisco (CA); Remote; USD 180,000 - 280,000; Full time

Benefits offered by this job

Medical, dental, and vision coverage

Ancillary benefits

401(k)

Unlimited discretionary time off (DTO)

10 paid holidays a year

Paid parental leave

Job summary

Patch is a remote-first company with a global team, focused on building AI-native products for local communities and advertisers. You will lead platform product efforts, working hands-on with engineers and customers to deliver high-impact outcomes.

Ideal candidates bring 5+ years of leading technical/product teams, 10+ years engineering experience, and fluency in JTBD framing. You will thrive in a remote-first culture with strong leadership standards.

Qualifications

• 5+ years of leading leaders in technical and product roles in entrepreneurial environments.
• 10+ years of engineering experience or managing engineering teams, with ability to reason about architecture, data, feasibility, and trade-offs.
• Hands-on: prototype, inspect data, talk with customers, and drive substance of product leadership.
• Fluent in Clay Christensen's JTBD framework.
• Lead with curiosity, candor, and low ego.

Responsibilities

• Lead commercial success for platform products with velocity and boldness.
• Help sales monetize AI work with large brands (separate from platform products).
• Find ways to make journalists' careers more rewarding financially and operationally.

Skills

Leadership experience in technical and

Tools

JavaScript/TypeScript

React

Next.js

Node.js

AWS

Job description

About You

• You have clear and proven attribution of commercial success and business outcomes in self-serve SMB products (i.e. products similar to Patch's promoted events and featured business listings: self-serve, low price point, recurring).

• You are fluent in Clay Christensen's JTBD framework.

• You have 5+ years of leading leaders in technical and product roles in entrepreneurial environments.

• You have technical credibility: 10+ years of experience as an engineer and/or managing engineering teams, and the ability to reason directly about architecture, data, feasibility, and trade-offs.

• You are hands-on: You prototype, inspect the data, talk with customers and work through details with the team; you do not delegate the substance of product leadership.

• You lead with curiosity, candor, self-awareness, low ego, and a sense of humor.

What We Offer / Why Patch

• Patch -- the largest, and one of the few thriving local media businesses -- has been on the cutting edge of AI since 2022. We have approximately 15,000 communities with AI newsletters that have a 94+ NPS. Our moderation for 160M active users (and many other parts of the business) are AI-native.

• Our work connecting people with their communities matters. We are Patchy: we have fun and take our mission seriously but not ourselves.

• Even if you are a world-class leader, you will become a better leader at Patch through our leadership standards. All applicants for the role will go through them.

• Competitive medical, dental, and vision coverage

• Ancillary benefits

• 401(k)

• Unlimited discretionary time off (DTO)

• 10 paid holidays a year

• Paid parental leave

Product and Technology Environment

• Patch’s products span consumer web and mobile, email, publishing, user-generated content, payments, data, search and advertising integrations.

• The technology environment includes JavaScript/TypeScript, React, Next.js, Node.js, Drupal/PHP, AWS, Heroku, Pantheon, GCP/BigQuery/GA4, Stripe, Auth0/Okta, Typesense/OpenSearch, GitHub/Jira and modern AI tools.

• You need not master the stack, but you must be technically fluent and able to earn the trust of engineers.

What You Will Lead

• Commercial success for platform products, leading with force, courage, and velocity. If you are doing something common in media, it is not bold enough.

• Helping sales make more money, especially through applying our AI work with large brands (separate from platform products)

• Finding ways to make our journalists' careers more rewarding financially and operationally.

Working at Patch

Patch is remote-first, with employees and contractors across countries and time zones. The ideal candidate feels a real connection to our mission: keeping people informed about their communities and helping local businesses and event marketers get the word out to the audiences that matter most.