Tech lead jobs

Hi! We're Forerunner.

We believe that climate adaptation is a necessity, not a luxury, and communities deserve access to powerful software that helps them plan for the future. The challenge of climate change is complex – it implicates how municipalities plan, manage capital, and communicate to both residents and higher levels of government. Forerunner helps local communities do these things better by empowering them to access, understand, and mobilize local-level flood risk data at scale.

The Role

We're looking for a Senior Full-Stack Engineer with 5+ years of product engineering experience to join our Dashboard team. You'll build features that help floodplain managers save homes and lives - from real-time flood risk visualizations to automated permit workflows that cut response times from weeks to hours. This is a product ownership role where you'll work directly with government users who are on the frontlines of climate adaptation.

You'll work on customer-facing features using TypeScript, React, PostgreSQL with PostGIS for geospatial analysis, and AWS. Your work will include processing hundreds of different geospatial datasets, creating intuitive interfaces for complex grant application workflows, and building APIs that integrate with a variety of different government systems - modernizing how America prepares for and adapts to climate change.

Engineers at Forerunner can work remote from anywhere within the United States. We offer schedule flexibility and ask for accountability in return. We are unable to sponsor H1-B visas at this time, so permanent residency or citizenship is required.

We strongly encourage people from underrepresented groups to apply - the problem of climate change impacts all of us, and we want to reflect that within our team's composition.

What You'll Do

• Own product features end-to-end - from database design to React components
• Lead technical initiatives without formal authority - mentor peers, drive best practices, and influence architecture decisions
• Ship code that matters - 80% new features, 20% system improvements
• Plan and execute complex projects with minimal supervision
• Participate in on-call rotation (once every 10 weeks)
• Collaborate closely with product, design, and customer success teams

What We're Looking For

Required Experience:

• 5+ years of product engineering experience (not just writing code - building and shipping products)
• 3+ years of TypeScript (4+ strongly preferred)
• 3+ years of React.js
• 2+ years of informal or formal technical leadership (mentoring, code reviews, technical decision-making)
• Track record of independently delivering complex features from ambiguous requirements
• Strong SQL and database design skills
• Excellence in remote communication and self-management

Nice to Have:

• Previous tech lead or engineering management experience
• AWS/containerization experience
• Familiarity with PostGIS and/or other geospatial technologies
• React Native
• Government or climate tech experience

What We Offer

Forerunner is an early stage company with an interdisciplinary team. We are motivated by seemingly intractable problems and work hard to support one another.

We're mission-driven. Our mission orients our business strategy and pushes us to work with a sense of urgency. We're in the weeds - our entire team spends time engaging with our partners in the field to better understand the real-world problems they face.

We're a small team. As a member of our growing team, you will quickly become an invaluable part of our organization and have a meaningful impact on our business and technical direction. We welcome unique perspectives and backgrounds. Your opinion matters and we hope you'll share it. 

We build each other up. A team works best when its members are adequately equipped with the tools to tackle the problems they are facing. Forerunner strives to provide adequate feedback and appropriate learning opportunities to help all its team members expand their skills.

We want you to be happy and healthy. Forerunner offers competitive compensation, health/vision/dental coverage, a 401k plan, and one expensed lunch per week. We also have a quarterly wellness reimbursement so that you can have flexibility in defining what "health" means to you.

Compensation

The salary range for this position is $150,000 - $215,000. This posting may span more than one career level. Compensation is determined based on a variety of factors, including an individual's skills, experience, qualifications, and working location.