Contract Software Engineer

Build out Talent Commons, a shared talent database for organizations across the AI safety ecosystem. Note: This role description is a first draft. Scope, salary, and responsibilities may evolve as our plans develop over the coming weeks, and we’ll keep you in the loop about any changes if you apply. About Kairos Kairos is a nonprofit accelerating talent into AI safety and policy. In just under two years, we’ve trained over 1000+ people through our flagship programs: SPAR: The largest AI safety research fellowship, with 400+ mentees per round mentored by researchers from Anthropic, Redwood Research, RAND, MIT, the UK AI Security Institute, and others. Generator Residency: In partnership with Constellation, a platform for generalist talent to pitch, build, and ship projects that build capacity and infrastructure across the AI safety ecosystem, with advisors from OpenAI, AI Futures Project, METR, and more. Global Challenges Project: A workshop series introducing promising students to careers in AI safety and biosecurity, run several times a year across Oxford, Boston, and Berkeley. Pathfinder Fellowship: Helping grow the global network of AI safety university groups from a few dozen to nearly 100, with $1.4M+ in funding to support their work. We see ourselves as a portfolio of highly impactful projects in a fast-evolving field. By the end of 2027, we expect to double in size and launch several new initiatives addressing critical gaps in the ecosystem. The Role We’re looking for a contract software engineer to ship Talent Commons, a consent-based talent database that lets organizations across the AI safety ecosystem (e.g. MATS, Horizon, Constellation, BlueDot, 80,000 Hours, of course Kairos) coordinate on talent. You’d work closely with Jesse Gilbert (founding generalist) and Agustín Covarrubias (co-director). We’re aiming for a 3-5 month engagement, ideally starting by end of July 2026, with the possibility to extend. What You’ll Do Design the frontend, backend, and integrations for Talent Commons. This includes the participant dashboard, org query interface, consent flows, and admin tooling. Design the data model and access controls. Talent Commons holds sensitive career data, and we need strong guarantees around who can see what, when, and how everything gets logged. Onboard partner orgs. You’ll set up authorized-user agreements, query interfaces, and data ingestion from Airtable and other systems. Lean heavily on AI coding tools. Claude Code, Cursor, etc. will be your friend here, and will enable us to ship this far faster than we would otherwise. Who You Are High agency and self-directed. You’ll drive the work mostly autonomously, with weekly syncs and async check-ins as needed. Effective with AI coding tools. You use Claude Code, Cursor, or similar daily, and have good judgment on when to lean on them. Trustworthy with sensitive data. Talent Commons holds career data with real downside risk if mishandled. You take that seriously and bake it into how you build. Mission-aligned, with context on AI safety. You care about making the transition to transformative AI go well, and you have enough context on the ecosystem to engage well with partner orgs and make good product calls. While not required, we especially value: Experience with TypeScript, React, and PostgreSQL or Convex Experience building products with sensitive personal data (HR tech, healthcare, fintech) Familiarity with data protection and privacy compliance Existing AI safety or adjacent nonprofit experience Why Work With Us You’ll be working toward reducing risks from advanced AI, potentially the most important challenge of our time. Talent Commons is intended to be infrastructure that orgs across the field rely on. Clear, well-scoped project. Stakeholders are engaged, design work is well underway, and there’s a clear path to shipping in 3-5 months. Possibility to extend. If the work goes well, there’s room to extend into other software based field building projects at Kairos. Collaborate regularly with leading AI safety researchers, policy professionals, funders, and organizers.

What We Offer

Hourly rate: $70-$120/hr (anchored to the US), with variance depending on experience and location, with potential for additional compensation for exceptional candidates Travel covered: Work-related travel and expenses covered Logistics Engagement: 3-5 month contract starting by end of July 2026, with possibility to extend Hours: Open to full-time or part-time, with a minimum of around 20 hours/week. Flexible on how you structure your time within that We prefer candidates who can attend meetings in the ET time zone (though our team currently spans GMT-8 to GMT+1).

Our Culture

We’re a small, high-trust team motivated by the urgent challenge of making advanced AI go well. We try hard to figure out where we’re wrong, which means we say uncomfortable things to each other and change our minds fairly often. We value scout mindset, agility, and collaboration with the broader ecosystem over territorial thinking. We also believe meaningful work should be enjoyable. We support each other’s well-being, celebrate wins, and maintain a healthy sense of humor even when the work is hard. Application Process Application form (10–20 mins) Screening call (15 mins) Take-home assignment (1.5–3 hours, paid) Interview (45 mins) Reference checks Work trial (3–4 days, paid) Offer If you’re excited about this role but unsure whether you meet every qualification, we encourage you to apply anyway. Questions? Reach out at [email protected]. Know someone who might be a good fit? If your referral gets hired and completes 6 months with us, we’ll pay you a $5,000 referral bonus. Learn more here. Apply To This Job