About Appsmith

Appsmith is an open-source, low code software that helps developers build applications quickly, usually within only hours.

Since being introduced less than two years ago, Appsmith’s open source software has more than 10 million downloads, more than 25,000 stars (up 12x since 2021) on Github and is used at over 10,000 organizations across 150 countries.

We’ve raised $51.5 mn in funding based on the tremendous market opportunity and our success to date.

We are a global and fully remote organization, excited to welcome new teammates to our collaborative environment and high-performance culture.

See our GitHub repo here: https://github.com/appsmithorg/appsmith

Company Vision

We believe every organization should have the ability to develop high performing internal applications quickly and cost-effectively. Every enterprise needs to create custom internal applications, spending between 10% to 40% of their engineering resources on them. Yet they often take a backseat to customer-facing applications because they are challenging, expensive and slow to build. Appsmith is already enabling software engineers to transform how they build internal apps, often building them 10 times faster with Appsmith. In the future we’re building, custom software developed for internal users will look and work no differently than the best out-of-the-box SAAS products. Internal users will demand great UX, great customer support, and great reliability from their in-house development teams because Appsmith has made it quick and painless for developers to build, deploy and maintain custom software.

What do we value?

Above all, we value a growth mindset. As a team of learners, we read, talk to people and listen to feedback constantly. We love working with people who have strong opinions, weakly held. Self starters and ambitious people form the backbone of our team. Do you want to work on bigger projects? Are you comfortable setting large goals and then accomplishing them? We value consistency and reliability. For example, sticking to committed deadlines, showing up on time etc. We believe that predictability makes teams run a lot smoother. It’s the little things that matter. Attention to detail shows that we empathize with our users, our colleagues and anyone else that we interact with. Are you a practical optimist? Our founding team strongly believes in a better future. We believe in playing our part to make that future a reality.

Overview:

Appsmith is seeking a highly motivated and experienced Head of Engineering to lead our engineering team. This role will be responsible for the operational success of our engineering organization and report directly to the CTO while coaching a team of 10+ engineering managers.

Key Responsibilities:

• Lead and manage the engineering team, providing guidance, support, and mentorship to team members to ensure that they are performing at a high level and meeting project deadlines.
• Collaborate with product management and design teams to ensure that the engineering team is aligned with the company's product roadmap.
• Foster a culture of innovation and continuous improvement within the engineering team.
• Work with cross-functional teams to ensure that our engineering efforts are aligned with our marketing, sales, and customer success teams.
• Continuously evaluate and improve our engineering processes to ensure that we are delivering high-quality software on time and within budget with effective engineering processes, including development methodologies, tooling, and best practices
• Drive innovation and technical excellence by staying up-to-date on the latest industry trends and technologies and providing input and support to the CTO in making technical decisions
• Foster a culture of collaboration and continuous improvement, encouraging team members to continually improve their skills and processes
• Hire and develop top talent, establishing clear roles and responsibilities and fostering a culture of collaboration and innovation

Qualifications:

• Bachelor's or Master's degree in Computer Science or a related field
• 10+ years of experience in software engineering, with a minimum of 5 years in a leadership role preferably having managed managers
• Strong technical expertise and comfortable managing engineering teams across frontend and backend technologies
• You have designed, built, and scaled production applications
• You know what high quality code — and software engineering processes — look like and know how to foster an environment that creates them.
• You have a proven track record of defining, communicating and improving the quality of multiple teams that have worked under your leadership
• You’re passionate about building and have worked on challenging or ambitious projects
• Familiarity and comfort with a fully remote working environment

Nice to have

• Experience working in a fast-paced startup environment with an engineering team that has seen scale e.g. 5x-10x growth
• Familiarity with the challenges our product solves - call them dashboards, admin panels, CRUD apps, workflow software, or internal tools
• Experience in contributing to open source software and/or a deep understanding of open source business models
• Experience working with modern frontend frameworks (for example React, Vue.js)
• Working knowledge of server side programming languages like Java, NodeJS or Python

The Roadmap for Success in this Role

First 30 days

• Meet with all engineering managers and begin to attend weekly team meetings
• Sync twice weekly or more with the CTO
• Spend time learning the product and build your first app
• Familiarize yourself with the current product roadmap and the company’s strategic goals

Next 60 days

• Meet the entire engineering team
• Develop a comprehensive understanding of the engineering team’s operations, tools and processes
• Establish regular communication with Engineering teams and managers to ensure healthy, bi-directional feedback and organizational learning
• Establish relationships with other teams including Product, Design, Marketing and Customer Success

By 6 Months

• Articulate specific suggestions for improving the quality and velocity of the engineering team by identifying misalignment in team structures, gaps in skill sets, inconsistencies in process and other opportunities for improvement
• Collaborate with the CTO and Engineering Managers to develop key performance indicators (KPIs) for the engineering team and establish a process for tracking them.
• Implement the plan for improving the engineering processes, tools, and systems.

After 6 Months

• Work with the CTO to co-own the next quarter’s technical roadmap and prepare to assume sole ownership by the fourth quarter of your first year
• Develop a plan for hiring additional engineers or expanding the team, if needed.
• Develop a plan for training and professional development for the engineering team.
• Ensure that the engineering team is meeting their KPIs and making progress towards the company's strategic goals
• Establish a culture of innovation and continuous improvement within the engineering team.
• Establish a plan for presenting the engineering team's progress and accomplishments to the company's leadership team.

Remote working: Appsmith is a fully distributed and remote team.

Diversity and Inclusion: Appsmith is dedicated to maintaining a diverse team and an inclusive work environment because our success depends on it. We welcome all people to apply for roles with Appsmith, especially women and other disadvantaged populations and we appreciate non-traditional career paths.

What is the recruitment process?

As a small team, it’s imperative that all of us get to know each other before taking the leap. We want to ensure you succeed in your role within our team. Each conversation (video conference) with us will last about 60 mins. Typically the whole process takes between 5 - 10 business days depending on your and our schedules.

Introductory call: A phone call with the Head of People give us a chance to introduce our company & product to you as well as get to know you. If you find our product vision interesting & exciting for you to work on, we will move to the next steps.

Conversation I: This is a video call that allows for a deeper conversation, with our CTO. Expect to discuss your past work in detail.

Conversation 2: This is a video call that allows for a deeper conversation, with our CPO. Expect to discuss your past work in detail.

Culture fit conversation: Conversations with the CEO and quick meetings with our team members to ensure that there is a culture-fit.

Extending an offer: If all goes well, we will extend an offer which includes financial benefits, equity stock grants and any other benefits.

Benefits:

• Budget to setup your home office
• Medical insurance for self and dependants
• Self-education budget for books, courses, and conferences
• Flexible holiday schedule
• Paid Maternity and Paternity leave