Job Application for Tech Lead & PM (TPM) at AE Studio

We are a development, data science and design studio that works closely with founders and executives to create custom software and machine learning solutions.

Agency Enterprise Studio is a company based in Los Angeles and we're looking for the world's most effective developers that are also a cultural fit to work with us on projects that increase Human Agency.

We are looking for the best of the best. People who love what they do and are legitimately excellent at it.

Is this you?

If you answered this with an unequivocal yes, then it might not be the best fit.

We also want people who understand that no one knows everything, don't have egos, understand their own shortcomings and are excited to grow.

We want people who are badass but also humble and care about helping their team. We want people who get shit done and give a shit. We want people who don't care about titles but care about results.

We are asking for a lot. What we can offer you?

A legitimate meritocracy. We don't care if you fancy huh, we care if you are actually good at your job. Been passed over for the guy who's great at talking to the EVP about how you just need to move to microservices but just pushed several critical bugs to production? That will not happen here.
The ability to work with other people like you. And the joy of not having to work with people who aren't - no shitty devs, assholes, or devs who spend 2 hours a day working and 6 hours on TikTok and spreading office gossip.
An intensive onboarding bootcamp where you will be challenged, tested, and learn a ton. While we don't like firing people or having them quit, we care more about guaranteeing #2 and this process is meant to weed people out who aren't a fit.
A highly supportive atmosphere. We have a high standard for performance, but we will do everything we can to help each individual attain it. Everyone at all levels of the company is willing to pitch in and provide advice, mentorship, or even jump in to get our hands dirty coding, organizing the backlog, or talking to clients when a team needs extra support. We're in this together.
The ability to work on some of the most exciting technical and product challenges that exist today. We work with clients, who bring us in to work on their most critical and important tasks because they know we can deliver and on our own internal projects which solve real needs. We are leaders in the BCI space where we are constantly pushing towards our long-term goal of developing the BCI OS in a way that is agency-increasing. We also work on complex blockchain projects with legitimate use cases. We also build best-in-class web and mobile applications and have some of the world's best data scientists.
The ability to work on a range of projects in different fields, industries, and stacks for companies ranging from early-stage startups to enterprise.
A diversified employee equity program that includes equity in client and skunkworks projects. And the opportunity to potentially have AE support you doing your own startup as part of our skunkworks program.
Competitive pay with regular performance-based raises and other fun stuff including company retreats, a really nice office, health and pet insurance, a cake to embarass you on your birthday, etc.

STACK

You will be working mostly with JavaScript and libraries/frameworks in its ecosystem.

JavaScript / TypeScript
React / Angular
Node / Next.js / Apollo
Everything else in the JavaScript ecosystem

YOU WILL

Work Full-time.
Constantly communicate with clients.
Create user stories and plan next steps.
Lead software projects.
Mentor team members.
Tackle product problems and set the technology strategy for our clients.
Work with 10x devs, designers, data scientists.
Work in internal projects and client projects.
Build projects with a product focused mentality while keeping your code clean.
Build modern, efficient apps and test that they work correctly.
Review pull requests from other members of the team.
Have a founder mentality and proactively solve problems.
Wear any hats needed to get the job done.

ABOUT YOU

A minimum of 4+ years of experience with managing projects, teams and clients.
A minimum of 5+ years of programming experience with our stack.
- realizing in the middle of the night you forgot a major edge case that you can’t believe hasn’t burned you yet and need to fix asap
- git blaming some shitty code and realizing it was you, deciding to never git blame again
- having some super strong preference about the way something “needs to be done” that you read in a book, forum, conference or fancy colleague, being super militant about enforcing it and judgemental about people who don’t already do it. and then realizing this was wrong
- you had a stack you thought was universally superior but now you think people should just pick the right tool for the job
- being such an expert at something that you forget why anyone would think this is hard, then having to learn something new and sucking at it at first and remembering that programming actually is a skill, then getting really great at that
Enjoy being hands-on in the codebase, but are also great at managing and mentoring other developers & designers and making sure projects stay on track.
You have a strong command of fluent/business English speaking and writing skills.
Experience working with Agile. Extreme Programming, Scrum or Kanban.
Growth mindset.
Like your work and accomplish many things.
Ownership mentality.
Problem-solving skills.
Self-management skills. Can work independently/autonomously.
Ability to communicate effectively and work exclusively in English. (This is a must)
Willing to work with new technologies, different environments.
Willing to work with everything and anything, Full Stack.

OTHER STUFF ABOUT US

Remote work.
Equity.
401K
Platinum health insurance.
Opportunity to be part of a fast-growing team with a happy bunch of former entrepreneurs, data scientists, full stack developers, UX/UI designers and product managers.
Opportunity to grow and advance in your career or flex your entrepreneurial side by participating in our internal skunkworks projects (some projects spin out with team members as the C-suite)
We provide resources for you to grow and learn on the job (this includes Udemy classes, books, participation in events, mentoring and - of course - the latest generation hardware.)
Offices right on Abbot Kinney, in the heart of Venice, CA. Salt & Straw is steps from our office, and we get discounts in some Abbot Kinney stores.
Weekly lunches with the US team. Monthly happy hours with friends and families. Occasional VR and game nights, if you are into that.
Yearly retreat bringing together the whole team.

THE INTERVIEW PROCESS

Initial conversation, we get to know each other and see if it makes sense for both sides.
Live coding test.
Final interview.
Note: There are an increasing number of scammers out there that are taking advantage of our company's name to scam people with fake offers that result in you ultimately giving the scammers money. Please make sure anyone who contacts you is contacting you from the domains ae.studio, agencyenterprise.com, agencyenterprisestudio.com (please make sure that the sender really is from those domains). If you have any questions about any interviews or offers you might have received and seem bogus, please contact recruiting-offers@ae.studio.

Equity

_{Working at AE means receiving equity in some of our client projects and in the Skunkworks projects we incubate. The equity granted is priced at a value of $0 when you receive it. If it were otherwise, you'd be forced to pay taxes. But to be clear, there are no free lunches, only the choice of who pays for your sandwich.}

_{At AE, the equity you receive is not free to AE. We invest millions annually in Skunkworks projects - paying our employees to build technology for which no client pays a bill. We receive equity from certain clients, which means we accept less in terms of our billable rate. We then pass that equity on to our employees. Sure it's priced at $0 on day 1 - a call option on a stock trading at $100 with a strike price of $100 is priced at $0 today for tax purposes, but you'd want to receive that option. If you received that option on a dozen stocks, you'd be fairly confident that some of them would be worth a lot more than $0.}

_{Offering this equity (by investing in Skunkworks or offering clients a lower rate) comes out of AE's margins. Theoretically, we should be lowering salaries to compensate. But we're competitive on that front as well. Over the long-term, we believe AE employees who stick around are likely to fare extremely well monetarily (no legal promises). We think long-term. You should too when you choose your employer.}

_{We are looking to hire people who think long term. People create exponentially more value here in their 3rd or 4th year rather than their 1st or 2nd, and that only increases. The value you create leads to more equity issued every year, and you retain it while you remain at AE or at a Skunkworks co that spins out, in order to free up equity for others, which is how we afford to be generous with the equity.}

_{* Disclaimer: If you leave AE on good terms, you can retain 20% of your equity if you continue to send leads our way, share our core values, etc. If you leave AE for your own AE-incubated Skunkworks project (or someone else's), you retain 100% of your equity. Folks create exponentially more value here in their 3rd and 4th years than their 1st or 2nd - we want folks who think long-term like we do.}

_{Salary range from $120k/year to $220k/year. Not in the range? That's fine, you can still apply and our team may fit you in a more senior position that we're not actively hiring right now, but we are growing fast and may have other openings soon.}