Lead Engineer, Discover

About Us

Circle is building the world's leading all-in-one platform for online communities. We make it possible for creators, coaches, educators, and businesses to bring together their audience with engaging discussions, live streams, events, chat, courses, and payments — all in one place, all under their own brand. We’re proud to be a fully remote company of around 200 (and growing!) team members from 30+ countries around the world.

We seek exceptional individuals around the world, set them up to do the best work of their lives, and in turn, create a meaningful impact in their own lives. We don't track hours, but we do manage for high expectations very closely. We collaborate across time zones, are highly async, and like to document a lot. Twice a year, we bring the whole company together in beautiful places around the world for our company offsites.

So far, we’ve hosted offsites in Turkey, Portugal, Mexico, Thailand, Colombia, Italy, Ireland, and more, with still more to come! Check out our Careers page for more about working at Circle.

We’re building something game-changing at Circle: a discovery marketplace where millions can find creators, communities, and products to help them achieve their highest personal and professional goals. You'll own the recommendation engine behind the feed and marketplace for Discover. Think of a Pinterest, Reddit or Instagram‑style product, reimagined with a mission to help people achieve their goals instead of distracting them with endless doom scrolling.

Through Discover, you will be building technology that could help millions of people grow, self‑actualize, and live their best lives. As the Lead Engineer for Discover, you'll report directly to our Chief of Staff and work side‑by‑side with Circle’s founders to bring this vision to life. You'll also lead and manage the Discover engineering team, currently a team of 2 engineers, with an ambitious and growing roadmap.

• Leading a small, senior team of engineers to build the discovery feed — the core recommendations engine that powers how consumers find creators, products, and communities that help them grow.
• Partnering closely with Circle’s CEO and co‑founders to execute on a vision that redefines discovery in the creator economy.
• Designing, implementing, and iterating on large‑scale ML systems, from embeddings and ranking models to experimentation frameworks, to reach product/market fit.
• Owning the technical roadmap for the feed: balancing speed, reliability, and long‑term architectural bets.
• Using data, experimentation, and engineering intuition to make fast, high‑quality decisions that unlock transformational consumer experiences.
• Obsessing over the craft, quality, and performance of the algorithms that turn Circle Discover into a household name.

• 5+ years of hands‑on software engineering experience, with at least 2+ years focused on machine learning, data, or recommendation systems.
• Experience building or scaling feeds, ranking systems, or large‑scale consumer‑facing ML products.
• Strong proficiency in backend and data engineering skills — from system design to product ionizing ML models.
• Deep understanding of consumer app dynamics and what drives product/market fit in discovery and recommendation experiences.
• The curiosity and drive to learn fast, experiment aggressively, and thrive in a highly dynamic environment.
• Comfortable in a fast‑paced environment with a certain level of ambiguity, especially when learning and picking up new technologies when projects require it.
• Strong alignment with our values, find our values on our career page if you haven't read up on them yet.
• You are proficient in English (spoken, written, and reading) at a CEFR Level C2 / ILR Level 5.

$250,000 - $300,000 USD per year

The cash compensation range shown is a starting point for a conversation. Given the unique upside of this role, stock compensation will be a highly generous aspect of your compensation, with the addition of highly generous milestone‑based accelerators. This is a high risk/high reward role with maximum upside.

• Fully remote: work from anywhere in the…