VP, Engineering

Turn/River; San Francisco (CA); On-site; USD 345,000 - 355,000; Full time

Benefits offered by this job

Medical, dental, and vision insurance covered 100%

Flexible vacation policy

401K matching

Paid parental leave

Commuter benefits

Work from home Mondays & Fridays

Energetic work environment with team events

Job summary

Turn/River in San Francisco is seeking a VP of Agent Engineering to enhance engineering capacity in portfolio companies. In this role, you will collaborate with CTOs and CPOs to build AI agents that streamline feature development, combining hands-on coding with strategic leadership.

The ideal candidate has extensive experience in software engineering and AI systems, capable of influencing technical directions while validating concepts through working demos. This position offers an attractive compensation package and a hybrid work model.

Qualifications

• 15+ years in software engineering with designed, built, and shipped systems.
• 3+ years building agentic AI systems in production.
• Experience in B2B or enterprise software environments.

Responsibilities

• Identify high-yield feature patterns in company backlogs.
• Prototype agents end-to-end to prove approaches.
• Technically lead the agent team and set quality bars.

Skills

Software engineering

Building agentic AI systems

LLM orchestration patterns

B2B or enterprise software environments

Organizational collaboration

Job description

About Turn/River

Turn/River Capital is a private equity firm that applies a proprietary growth engineering strategy to investing, partnering with software businesses to accelerate growth and build enduring value. The firm’s team of equal parts investors and operators provides hands‑on operational support and the flexible capital to systematically scale marketing, sales and customer success at its portfolio companies. Founded in 2012 and based in San Francisco, Turn/River has $5.6bn in committed capital and invests globally with a focus on North America and Europe.

About the Role

Turn/River is seeking a VP of Agent Engineering to unlock engineering capacity in our portfolio companies. You'll work directly with CTOs, CPOs, and engineering teams at our portfolio companies, building AI agents that automate recurring feature development. This is a hands‑on building role where you will write agent code, design orchestration architectures, and partner with engineers daily.

Key Responsibilities

• Identify recurring, high-yield feature patterns in portfolio company backlogs that consume disproportionate engineering time and effort
• Decompose those patterns into agent task hierarchies, orchestration flows, and validation loops
• Prototype agents end‑to‑end yourself, proving the approach and value on real backlog items before involving other engineers
• Use data and build working demos to earn CTO/CPO buy‑in in order to dedicate the engineering team to agent development
• Technically lead the agent team: review architecture, pair on hard problems, set quality bars for agent output
• Instrument and track success: agent evaluation and accuracy, engineering capacity freed, roadmap velocity, defect rates
• Apply learnings across the portfolio, sharpening the approach and playbook(s) with each engagement

Qualifications

• 15+ years in software engineering, with production systems you personally designed, built, and shipped
• 3+ years building agentic AI systems in production – architecting orchestration, wiring tool use, debugging agent failures – not just directing others who do
• Fluency in LLM orchestration patterns with strong convictions about agent reliability that come from lived experience, not just white‑papers
• Productive in a large, unfamiliar codebase within days/weeks
• Experience in B2B or enterprise software environments, including comfort with on‑prem, legacy architectures, and compliance constraints
• Ability to walk a CTO through a technical strategy and back it up with a working demo
• Effective across organizational boundaries – equally comfortable pairing with engineers and presenting to executive teams
• Consulting, PE or VC portfolio operations, or multi‑company technical leadership is a plus, but not required – we want hands‑on operators

Location

• San Francisco, hybrid work model

Compensation

• The annual base salary range for this role is $345,000 – $355,000, taking into account numerous variable factors that are considered in making compensation decisions including but not limited to skill sets, experience, training, licensure, certifications, and organizational requirements.
• This role is eligible to participate in the Turn/River carry program and a discretionary bonus program.

Benefits and Perks

The below benefits are offered to full‑time employees based out of our San Francisco office:

• An opportunity to make an impact across multiple high‑growth tech firms
• Competitive salary and discretionary bonus
• Medical, dental, and vision insurance covered 100% for employee & dependents
• Flexible vacation policy
• 401K matching
• Paid parental leave
• Commuter benefits
• Health and Wellness benefits
• Household Services benefits
• Home Office benefits
• Annual Home Office Equipment Reimbursement
• Donation matching
• Work from home Monday & Friday
• Energetic work environment with snacks and weekly team lunches 3x per week, centrally located near multiple public transit lines
• A company that enjoys having fun: holiday parties, annual company offsite and retreat, annual summer "work from anywhere" month

Turn/River provides equal employment opportunities (EEO) to all employees and applicants for employment without regard to race, color, religion, religious creed (including religious dress and grooming practices), national origin, ancestry, citizenship, physical or mental disability, medical condition (including cancer and genetic characteristics), genetic information, marital status, sex (including pregnancy, childbirth, breastfeeding, or related medical conditions), gender, gender identity, gender expression, natural hair styles, age (40 years and over), sexual orientation, veteran and/or military status, protected medical leaves (requesting or approved for leave under any applicable state, or federal leave act), domestic violence victim status, political affiliation, and any other characteristic or status protected by state or federal law.