Staff Design Engineer, AI Product

TL;DR

Staff Design Engineer, AI Product (JavaScript/TypeScript): Building and refining AI-powered product experiences for Thunderbolt, an open-source client for chat, search, research, workflow automation, and knowledge retrieval, with an accent on design-to-code execution, usability, accessibility, and enterprise readiness. Focus on prototyping ambiguous concepts, creating reusable interaction patterns, and designing trustworthy AI workflows with clear permissions, transparency, security, and human oversight.

Location: Remote within the United States. Applicants must reside in the United States and have permanent work authorization; visa sponsorship is not provided.

Salary: $185,000–$205,000 USD

Company

hirify.global’s Thunderbird organization develops privacy-respecting, open-source communication and productivity tools, including the AI-focused Thunderbolt product.

What you will do

• Build functional prototypes, experiments, and production-quality front-end experiences directly in the Thunderbolt codebase.
• Translate ambiguous product ideas, user workflows, partner feedback, and enterprise requirements into clear and usable product experiences.
• Define interaction patterns for AI-powered chat, search, research, automation, knowledge retrieval, and administration workflows.
• Use AI-assisted development tools while maintaining quality, usability, accessibility, security, and maintainability.
• Collaborate with product, design, engineering, enterprise-facing teams, contractors, and open-source contributors.
• Create reusable components, design-system elements, and interaction patterns that improve product consistency and team velocity.

Requirements

• 10+ years of relevant experience in design engineering, front-end engineering, UX engineering, or technically focused product design, with demonstrated leadership and impact.
• Strong JavaScript or TypeScript skills, experience with component-based frameworks, and the ability to build prototypes and production features in an application codebase.
• Strong product and interaction design judgment across usability, accessibility, information architecture, workflow design, and product polish.
• Experience designing or building AI-enabled experiences such as chat, search, agents, automation, knowledge interfaces, or workflow tools.
• Practical understanding of AI, privacy, security, data handling, permissions, transparency, and responsible AI requirements.
• Permanent US work authorization is required; visa sponsorship is unavailable.

Nice to have

• Experience with enterprise, developer, productivity, collaboration, or self-hosted software.
• Experience with design systems, component libraries, reusable front-end architecture, or shared interaction patterns.
• Experience with user research, usability testing, feature instrumentation, product discovery, or rapid experimentation.
• Experience working in open-source or highly collaborative engineering environments.

Culture & Benefits

• Fully remote work with schedule flexibility across time zones.
• Company-provided laptop, monthly remote work stipend, annual professional development stipend, Coursera access, and conference support.
• 24 days of PTO, birthday leave, year-end shutdown, wellbeing days, public holidays, and other paid leave.
• Quarterly wellbeing stipend, paid parental and sick leave, and employee assistance program.
• 401(k) contributions, health, dental, vision, disability, and life insurance.
• Collaboration with an international open-source community and distributed colleagues.

Hiring process

• Submit a cover letter and complete screening questions with authentic, experience-based responses.
• Portfolio, case studies, shipped work, or interactive prototypes may be reviewed during evaluation.