Lead Software Engineer

Lead Software Engineer | TypeScript, NestJS & Agentic AI | Early-Stage AI Startup

Salary: from £100,000, depending on experience, plus equity

Location: Victoria, central London. Four days in the office, Wednesdays from home

Working directly with the Head of Engineering

Around 80% hands-on, with a small team to lead

I’m working with an AI startup automating the operational work behind property management.

Their voice agent answers agency phones and helps handle everything from viewings to maintenance, connecting conversations to the systems and actions needed to get the work done.

They’re hiring a Lead Software Engineer to work alongside the Head of Engineering, take ownership of major parts of the product and help set the technical standard for a small team.

You’ll be making architecture decisions, building the harder parts yourself and helping other engineers deliver. There’s scope across the product, with the main engineering work centred on the backend and agentic pipelines.

What You’ll Work On

Design and build backend services and APIs in TypeScript, Node.js and NestJS

Develop the event-driven systems behind real-time voice-agent workflows

Build agentic pipelines with tool use, retries, guardrails and failure handling

Shape service boundaries and architecture as the product grows

Lead a small team, including remote engineers, through delivery, code reviews and mentoring

Set the standard for how the team builds with Claude Code and AI agents

Work with the Head of Engineering and product team to decide what to build and how

What They’re Looking For

Your current title could be Senior, Lead, Full Stack, Backend or Founding Engineer. What matters is what you’ve owned and built.

Deep Node.js and NestJS experience, with strong TypeScript

Experience designing systems and taking them through to production

Hands-on experience building with LLMs and agents, including understanding what breaks at scaleSomeone who already leads technical decisions, or is ready to take that step

Experience delivering in a small, fast-moving team where you had real responsibility

Regular use of Claude Code and agentic development tools, with a clear approach to checking the quality of what they produce

A strong degree in Computer Science, Engineering, Mathematics or a related subject

They’ll want to hear about your own contribution: the architecture decisions, the things you shipped and the problems you had to work through. Relevant side projects are welcome too.

The Stack

TypeScript, Node.js and NestJS

Next.js on the frontend

Monorepo and microservices architecture

Google Cloud and Kubernetes

PostgreSQL, MongoDB and Qdrant

Next.js, voice AI and vector database experience would all be useful. Strong full-stack engineers are very much in scope, provided they have the backend depth.

Why Join?

You’ll have a substantial say in the product, the architecture and how the engineering team works, while spending most of your time building.

AI is part of both the product and the daily engineering workflow. They’re looking for someone who enjoys experimenting with better ways to build, then turning those experiments into reliable software the whole team can use.

It’s an early-stage business with closely involved founders and high expectations. Priorities move quickly, and you’ll be expected to take ownership and contribute from day one. It will suit someone who wants that level of involvement and a hands-on role with room to lead.

The Package

Salary from £100,000, depending on experience

Equity

Victoria office, four days a week on site

Wednesdays working from home

Lead Software Engineer | TypeScript, NestJS & Agentic AI | Early-Stage AI Startup

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