Future AI Founder
Job description
About the role
This role is an operator rotation designed to turn expert human judgment into software by doing the human work at a molecular level. You will spend 6 to 18 months on the front line taking sales calls, processing applications, handling customer service, and working alongside underwriters. Your core job is to document every edge case, precedent, and decision trace that lives only in an operator's head so it can be automated. You learn the business by running it and build the structured templates, workflows, and specifications that engineering turns into production systems. The position is not an analyst role, and "Future AI Founder" is not a founder title, equity story, or strategy seat; it is a hard, execution-heavy frontline job. The name describes where the path can lead for people who are exceptional at the work, not a shortcut around it.
Key facts
What you'll do
- Do the frontline work. Take sales calls, process applications, handle customer service, sit with underwriters. Real volume, real customers, every day.
- Document the reality. Capture every process, decision, and edge case you hit - the stuff no one ever wrote down.
- Turn knowledge into systems. Build the templates and workflows that convert what you learned into structured data the rest of the company can use.
- Build with AI tools. Use Claude Code, Cursor, Lovable. Don't wait for permission to fix something.
- Hand it to engineering. Translate what you've learned into automation that outlasts you.
- Own the exceptions. Track the edge cases and decision traces that only exist in an operator's head today.
- Convert tribal knowledge into structured inputs. Translate undocumented heuristics into clear templates and specifications.
- Act as the execution engine. Run the business operations on the ground so that engineering can automate reliably.
- Partner directly with underwriters. Observe, ask, and refine the rules that govern real decisions.
- Create the playbook for scale. Capture what works so the company can replicate speed without losing quality.
- Drive clarity from ambiguity. Extract the logic behind decisions and make it explicit for systems and teammates.
- Enable faster onboarding. Make everyone after you faster by documenting the reality of the workflow.
- Maintain momentum on high standards. Operate at the pace of growth the company expects.
- Close the loop between insight and implementation. Ensure what you build in documentation ships as code.
Requirements
- Early in your career but already exceptional - recent grad, or 0-2 years with standout results.
- High agency. You build things and fix things without being told to.
- Willing to go deep before you go wide. You'll do the unglamorous work first.
- A pattern-spotter who can't see a broken process without wanting to redesign it.
- Comfortable with AI tools, or fast to get there.
- Based in San Francisco or willing to relocate to San Francisco.
- Available for a Monday-Friday schedule with a very early morning start and in-office 5 days a week.
- Able to commit to long days and on-site presence during the learning curve.
- Ready to compress years of learning into months through intense execution.
- Not looking for an advisory or strategy seat; prepared to do the work of running the business.
Nice to have
Nice to have: you've started something (a company, a project, a community); a technical background; prior customer-facing experience.
Practical notes
- Schedule: Monday-Friday, very early morning start, in-office 5 days a week.
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Location: San Francisco, in-office. Based in SF or willing to relocate.
- Process: 1.15-min founder call - alignment on mission and pace;
3. On-site day - meet the team, see the operation.
- To apply: Send your resume and a few sentences on why Harper.
; apply as soon as you are ready to compress learning into months and do the frontline work.
- Travel: Not applicable.
; indicate constraints during the founder call if relevant.
The honest day-to-day
- The job is execution, not analysis or strategy. You will be on the phone, in the queue, processing applications. If you're looking for a seat where you advise rather than do, this isn't it.
- The title is a destination, not a description. Nobody hands you a company. You earn the next thing by being undeniable at this thing first.
- The hours are long and the days are on-site. Mon-Fri, roughly 5 AM-8 PM. The learning curve is steep on purpose.
- The payoff is real for the right person. Twelve months of this is closer to five years of normal experience, and it's a genuine launching pad - into leadership at Harper, or to go start your own thing later. But that payoff is on the other side of the grind, not instead of it.
Compensation & logistics
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Salary: $125,000-$170,000 (depending on experience) + performance bonuses & equity
-
Location: San Francisco, in-office. Based in SF or willing to relocate.
- Schedule: Monday-Friday, very early morning start, in-office 5 days a week.
- Benefits: Uber commuter benefits; breakfast, lunch, and dinner provided; snacks, drinks, and coffee daily; free gym membership; health, dental, and vision insurance.
Process
1.15-min founder call - alignment on mission and pace
3. On-site day - meet the team, see the operation
To apply
Send your resume and a few sentences on why Harper. If you want to compress years of learning into months - and you're not too good to do the frontline work to get there - we want to talk.