Fast Facts

Join Handshake as a Software Engineer focused on enhancing the Fellow Experience by building and scaling full-stack systems that improve project discovery, matching, and onboarding for fellows in the AI economy.

Responsibilities: Key responsibilities include developing full-stack features for fellow matching and onboarding, designing backend APIs, and collaborating closely with product managers and designers to improve user experiences.

Skills: Candidates should have 2+ years of software engineering experience, proficiency in TypeScript, and familiarity with modern web stacks like Next.js, tRPC, and GraphQL.

Qualifications: A product-oriented mindset focusing on user experience and business outcomes is preferred, along with strong communication skills and a growth mindset.

Location: This position is based in San Francisco, California, United States.

Compensation: $145000 - $170000 / Annually

About Handshake

Handshake is the career network for the AI economy. 20 million knowledge workers, 1,600 educational institutions, 1 million employers (including 100% of the Fortune 50), and every foundational AI lab trust Handshake to power career discovery, hiring, and upskilling, from freelance AI training gigs to first internships to full-time careers and beyond. This unique value is leading to unparalleled growth; in 2025, we tripled our ARR at scale.

Why join Handshake now:

• Shape how every career evolves in the AI economy, at global scale, with impact your friends, family and peers can see and feel
• Work hand-in-hand with world-class AI labs, Fortune 500 partners and the world’s top educational institutions
• Join a team with leadership from Scale AI, Meta, xAI, Notion, Coinbase, and Palantir, among others
• Build a massive, fast-growing business with billions in revenue

About the Role

As a Software Engineer on the Fellow Experience team, you will build and scale full-stack systems that power the middle-of-funnel experience for fellows, from project discovery through successful onboarding.

You’ll work across frontend and backend surfaces to improve how fellows discover projects, apply, get matched, and onboard successfully. Your work will directly impact fellow volume, match quality, and conversion as we scale toward more intelligent automatic allocations.

This is a product-focused, full-stack role with real customer impact, close collaboration with product and design, and clear growth paths toward senior technical ownership.

The Fellow Experience team owns critical user journeys including the landing page experience for project invitations and applications, onboarding flows (confidentiality agreements, video/camera checks, educational programs, reading materials), project-specific assessments and recordings, and the internal tools that support manual matching.

In this role, you will:

• Build and iterate on full-stack features that support fellow matching, onboarding, and readiness for project work
• Contribute to the evolution of our automatic allocations system by implementing matching logic, workflows, and product improvements with guidance from senior engineers
• Design and ship backend APIs, asynchronous workflows, and frontend user experiences that are reliable, scalable, and intuitive
• Partner closely with product managers and designers to deliver polished, end-to-end user experiences
• Write high-quality, maintainable code while balancing speed and correctness
• Debug and resolve issues related to onboarding flows, matching outcomes, and system reliability
• Participate in code reviews and contribute to improving engineering standards and best practices
• Grow toward increased technical ownership by learning from senior engineers on the team

Desired Capabilities

• 2+ years of professional software engineering experience
• Experience building full-stack applications, with comfort working across frontend and backend
• Strong proficiency in TypeScript
• Experience with modern web stacks (Next.js, tRPC, GraphQL, PostgreSQL)
• Familiarity with asynchronous workflows or background job systems
• Product-oriented mindset with a focus on user experience and business outcomes
• Strong communication skills and comfort collaborating cross-functionally
• Growth mindset and eagerness to take on increasing responsibility

Extra Credit

• Experience with workflow orchestration tools such as Temporal
• Exposure to matching systems, marketplaces, or multi-step onboarding flows
• Background at high-growth or scaling technology companies
• Interest in AI-driven products, human-in-the-loop systems, or data platforms

Perks

Handshake delivers benefits that help you feel supported—and thrive at work and in life.

The below benefits are for full-time US employees.

🎯 Ownership: Equity in a fast-growing company

💰 Financial Wellness: 401(k) match, competitive compensation, financial coaching

🍼 Family Support: Paid parental leave, fertility benefits, parental coaching

💝 Wellbeing: Medical, dental, and vision, mental health support, wellness stipend

📚 Growth: Learning stipend, ongoing development

💻 Remote & Office: Internet, commuting, and free lunch/gym in our SF office

🏝 Time Off: Flexible PTO, 15 holidays + 2 flex days

🤝 Connection: Team outings & referral bonuses

Explore our mission, values, and comprehensive US benefits at joinhandshake.com/careers.