Senior Front-End Engineer, Web Dev Lead

About the Role

We are looking for our first Senior Front-End Engineer/Web Dev Lead to own the technical foundation of how Unconventional AI shows up on the web. This hands-on, high-agency role is for someone eager to both write excellent code and set the strategic direction of our web platform.

You will own our headless CMS end-to-end: the content model, the front-end that renders it, the integrations that feed it, and the publishing workflows our teams rely on every day. You will partner closely with the design, brand, and engineering teams to ship fast, performant, beautiful web experiences for a deeply technical audience.

You should be equally comfortable architecting a content model, building a pixel-perfect landing page in a modern JS framework, wiring up a CI/CD pipeline, and mentoring others on web best practices. As our first dedicated web engineer, you will define how we build for the web and grow the practice over time.

What You'll Do

Headless CMS Ownership (Core Surface)

• Own our headless CMS end-to-end: content modeling, schema design, roles and permissions, localization, and publishing workflows
• Design flexible, reusable content models and component libraries so marketing and content teams can ship without engineering bottlenecks
• Build and maintain the front-end that renders CMS content: blog, docs, and marketing landing pages
• Integrate the CMS with our front-end framework, preview environments, and third-party tools (analytics, forms, search, personalization)
• Manage webhooks, build triggers, and incremental rebuilds so content changes go live quickly and reliably
• Establish content governance: draft/review/publish workflows, versioning, and safe rollbacks

Front-End Engineering & Web Platform

• Build fast, accessible, responsive interfaces with modern frameworks (React / Next.js) and thoughtful component architecture
• Translate designs into polished, production-ready UI in close partnership with design
• Own Core Web Vitals and site performance: image optimization, code splitting, caching, and rendering strategy (SSR/SSG/ISR)
• Implement technical SEO and AEO fundamentals: semantic markup, structured data, metadata, sitemaps, and clean internal linking
• Ensure accessibility (WCAG) and cross-browser, cross-device quality through QA and automated testing
• Implement and maintain cookie consent and privacy compliance (GDPR, CCPA), including consent management, cookie banners, and data handling in analytics and tracking

Infrastructure, Tooling & Reliability

• Own hosting, deployments, and CI/CD (Vercel or similar), including preview deploys and environment management
• Set up monitoring, error tracking, and analytics instrumentation so we catch issues before users do
• Maintain site hygiene: dependency updates, security best practices, redirects, and uptime

Technical Leadership

• Set the technical direction and standards for our web platform as our first dedicated web engineer
• Partner with marketing, design, and engineering to scope work, prioritize, and ship on tight timelines
• Write clear documentation and mentor teammates on web and CMS best practices
• Evaluate and select tools, frameworks, and vendors as the web practice grows

What You Bring

• 5-8+ years building production web applications, with a strong front-end focus
• Deep expertise with a modern JS framework, ideally React and Next.js, and strong TypeScript, HTML, and CSS fundamentals
• Hands-on experience owning a headless CMS (Contentful, Sanity, or similar): content modeling, integrations, and publishing workflows
• Strong grasp of rendering strategies (SSR, SSG, ISR) and when to use each
• Proven track record shipping fast, performant sites and owning Core Web Vitals and PageSpeed Insights
• Familiarity with technical SEO/AEO, Google Tag Manager, accessibility, and analytics instrumentation
• Comfort with CI/CD, Git workflows, and modern hosting platforms
• A strong design sense and the ability to turn designs into polished, on-brand UI
• Fluency and comfort using AI tools day to day (coding assistants, LLMs, agentic workflows) 
• High agency, a bias toward shipping, and the ability to lead without a large team behind you

Nice to Have

• Experience as the first or founding web hire at an early-stage company
• Familiarity with edge functions, serverless, and API design
• Experience with A/B testing, personalization, or growth experimentation
• Comfort working in and around AI/ML products and technical developer audiences

Tools & Systems

• AI: AI coding assistants and LLM-based tools (Claude, Cursor, Copilot, v0, or similar)
• Frameworks: React, Next.js, TypeScript, Tailwind CSS
• Headless CMS: Contentful, Sanity, or similar (Storyblok, Hygraph, Payload)
• Hosting & CI/CD: Vercel, Netlify, GitHub Actions
• Design: Figma
• Analytics & Monitoring: GA4, Vercel Analytics, Sentry, PostHog/Mixpanel
• SEO: Ahrefs, SEMrush, Google Search Console
• Collaboration: GitHub, Notion, Slack, Linear

Why This Role Matters

Our website is the front door to Unconventional AI. This role owns the platform behind it: the systems that let us publish ideas, launch campaigns, and reach our community at speed. From a single blog post to a full site redesign, your work directly shapes how the world experiences our product and our brand.