Founding front-end engineer

Employment Type:

Full-time Hybrid/On-site: Los Angeles, CA (will consider remote and/or relocation)

As a Frontend Engineer at Smack, you will build the UI for complex problems. Our product leverages AI and mathematical optimization. For it to work, the UI must be exceptional at two things: First, it needs to make planning collaborative and simple. Maybe even fun. Basically, be the opposite of planning in PowerPoint. Second, it needs to enable human-in-the-loop autonomy. The UI is the portal for decision-makers to interact with Smack’s system at high-value human touchpoints and to audit the system's logic. You will build the visualization tools and dashboards to make this possible.

As part of our founding team, you’ll have strong ownership over major parts of our system. You’ll help design the systems, and choose the technologies.

What You’ll Do:

• Design, build, and deploy a collaborative UI that allows users to rapidly build tasks and prioritize thousands of items.
• Design, build, and deploy a course of action (COA) builder UI that allows users to compare plans.
• Work side by side with end-users to rapidly iterate on the product. This role requires travel to user sites.
• Rapidly prototype UIs to create great user experiences before building high-quality production versions.
• Build a high-quality system with good software engineering practices and ensure everything is well-documented.
• Ensure your code is well-tested (but not obsessively going for 100% test coverage).

Our Tech Stack:

• Typescript
• Svelte 5 / SvelteKit (Vite, Jest, Storybook and/or whatever other tools you help choose)
• Modern CSS with Tailwind
• Our backend is Python and FastAPI

As an early-stage startup, we are trying to find the right balance of enough process to have high-quality software that doesn’t require heroics to maintain, but not too much process that would waste time. You’ll help to determine this balance.

Required Qualifications:

• Bachelors in Computer Science, Operations Research, or another relevant technical degree (or strong demonstrated professional software engineering skills–the bar for non-traditional developers is high, but we’re open to folks without degrees if you know what you’re doing)
• Proficient in Typescript, CSS, and modern web development
• Eligible to obtain a TS/SCI security clearance

Preferred Qualifications:

• Experience with Svelte (or enjoy learning new frameworks)
• Experience with developing collaboration tools (especially with CRDTs and Yjs)
• You love working on interesting tech problems–if you’ve built your own personal or open source projects that’s great.
• You like improving UI/UX and other aspects of the product.
• Have worked with mapping or other geographic APIs
• Active TS/SCI security clearance

Who You Are:

• You are mission-driven.
• You love working on a team where we collaborate to solve a huge external challenge.
• You want to own taking a product UI from zero to one.
• You savor a good challenge. We’re a start-up. We have many.
• You work well with others. As a startup we’ll have to work together to figure out a lot of unknowns.

Our expected range is $120k-$170k depending on experience. Good health plans, 401(k) dental, vision, etc. Meaningful stock options in what we hope will be a successful startup with founders who have had successful exits and deep domain expertise. One of our major customers will be the US DoD and you need to be eligible for a TS/SCI clearance (as I understand it, this includes being a US Citizen with a clean record). We don’t yet have an office, but plan on opening one around West Los Angeles. We’d like the team to be primarily LA-based with a hybrid setup: early stage startups tend to work best with some time together. But for the right person, we’d be open to remote (with travel to visit) or Oahu-based.