Salient

About Us We’re building the AI infrastructure powering the future of financial operations - starting with automating the most painful and complex workflows in loan servicing. Backed by a16z and Y Combinator, with $65M raised in Series A funding. 8-figure ARR < 2 years already serving > 20% of the auto lending industry, and processing millions of real customer calls and transactions daily. Fully deployed with major financial institutions - not just PoCs. We are expanding into new financial services segments! In-person office culture in San Francisco, CA. We're fully integrated with our customers, own the full stack, and are moving fast to bring modern AI into regulated industries where precision, reliability, and performance matter most. Why We're Hiring We're scaling from 50 to 100+ employees over the next year and need a people leader to take our people function to the next level. We have the basics in place (Rippling, benefits), but we need someone who can build strategic HR infrastructure, shape our culture, and partner with leadership on talent decisions. The Role You'll be our first dedicated people leader, evolving our people function from foundational to strategic. You'll own everything from performance management to compensation frameworks, employee relations to culture initiatives. You report to the CEO and partner closely with leadership on all people decisions. What You'll Do Build and own our people strategy - performance management, compensation, employee development, and culture Partner with leadership on organizational design, headcount planning, and talent decisions Evolve HR infrastructure - refine policies, ensure compliance, optimize benefits programs Design and implement performance management frameworks - goal-setting, reviews, promotion cycles, career development Lead compensation strategy - maintain equitable pay bands, manage equity grants, conduct market benchmarking Drive culture and engagement initiatives - team events, values definition, employee feedback loops, DEI programs Manage employee relations - coach managers on difficult conversations, resolve conflicts, handle sensitive situations Build manager enablement programs - training on feedback, performance management, hiring decisions Ensure compliance with employment laws and regulations across all locations Partner with recruiting lead on hiring strategy and process improvements What We're Looking For Must-Haves: 5-8+ years in People/HR roles at high-growth startups, with at least 2 years in leadership Experience scaling people functions at early-stage companies (50-200 employees) Track record designing and implementing people processes (performance management, compensation, onboarding, career frameworks) Business partner mentality - you advise leadership on strategic decisions, not just execute HR tasks Strong coaching skills - you develop managers and help them navigate people challenges Comfort with ambiguity - you build infrastructure without waiting for perfect clarity Excellent judgment on sensitive employee matters Nice to Have: Experience in fintech, lending, or regulated industries Background in AI/ML or technical product companies Previous experience scaling a company through hyper-growth (50→200+ employees) Knowledge of multi-state employment compliance What Makes This Role Interesting Take the people function from foundational to strategic as our first people leader Direct partnership with CEO and leadership team on all people decisions Shape company culture during critical growth phase High impact - your work directly affects every employee and shapes our trajectory At Salient, we’re building at the edge of AI - fast, focused, and with real ownership. Sprints and major launches move quickly, and we look for people who are energized by that pace and ready to collaborate in person 4 days a week in our San Francisco office. We also offer a benefits package designed

About Us We’re building the AI infrastructure powering the future of financial operations - starting with automating the most painful and complex workflows in loan servicing. Backed by a16z and Y Combinator, with $65M raised in Series A funding. 8-figure ARR < 2 years already serving > 20% of the auto lending industry, and processing millions of real customer calls and transactions daily. Fully deployed with major financial institutions - not just PoCs. We are expanding into new financial services segments! In-person office culture in San Francisco, CA. We're fully integrated with our customers, own the full stack, and are moving fast to bring modern AI into regulated industries where precision, reliability, and performance matter most. The Role Split your time between inventing new AI product capabilities and scaling how enterprises discover, adopt, and expand their use of Salient. Half product manager building new capabilities, half growth operator removing friction from the customer journey. You’ll work at the intersection of AI innovation and enterprise go-to-market, owning initiatives from concept through customer rollout and measurable business impact. What You'll Do Own the roadmap for growth-critical product initiatives Ship 0→1 products collaborating with engineering, research, and design from concept to launch Work directly with customers and prospects to understand pain points and translate insights into product opportunities Drive data-informed decisions on what to build and how to position it Build and optimize enterprise growth motions Establish metrics and run experiments that prove what's working Ensure customer requests, tickets, and issues are triaged and resolved quickly Act as the voice of the customer internally, ensuring feedback loops directly inform product and growth priorities Drive customer retention and expansion, proactively identify risks, secure renewals, and uncover opportunities to increase contract value What We're Looking For Must-Haves: 4-8+ years in product, growth, or hybrid roles at fast-growing startups Experience building 0→1 products, ideally in AI, fintech, or B2B SaaS Balance of product intuition, data-driven decision-making Comfort working closely with engineers and researchers to ship fast in ambiguous environments Comfortable owning and driving customer relationship and product usage. Track record driving measurable user or revenue growth through product improvements Nice to Have: Background in compliance-heavy industries (fintech, lending, reg-tech) Technical fluency with AI/ML products Experience scaling enterprise adoption and driving expansion within existing accounts Previous experience as an early product hire building processes from scratch MBA At Salient, we’re building at the edge of AI - fast, focused, and with real ownership. Sprints and major launches move quickly, and we look for people who are energized by that pace and ready to collaborate in person 4 days a week in our San Francisco office with a start time of 8:00 AM. We also offer a benefits package designed to support our full-time employees: medical, dental, and vision coverage , a generous 401(k), and catered lunches. By applying, you acknowledge that your personal information will be processed in accordance with our Privacy Policy.

About Us We’re building the AI infrastructure powering the future of financial operations - starting with automating the most painful and complex workflows in loan servicing. Backed by a16z and Y Combinator, with $65M raised in Series A funding. 8-figure ARR < 2 years already serving > 20% of the auto lending industry, and processing millions of real customer calls and transactions daily. Fully deployed with major financial institutions - not just PoCs. We are expanding into new financial services segments! In-person office culture in San Francisco, CA. We're fully integrated with our customers, own the full stack, and are moving fast to bring modern AI into regulated industries where precision, reliability, and performance matter most. About the Role We’re looking for a Software Engineer, Product with a founder’s mindset to work directly with customers to deploy our Voice AI Agents in production environments. You will own implementations end to end, from requirements gathering and solution design to integration, testing, and launch - building customer-specific features that are then incorporated into our core platform. This role sits at the intersection of engineering, product, and customer execution. You will have real ownership over high-impact deployments, drive technical decisions, and help translate customer needs into scalable product improvements that power workflows for millions of borrowers. What You’ll Do Own the end-to-end execution of high-stakes customer engagements and projects, gathering requirements and determining how to best apply our Voice AI Agent solutions to meet customer needs. Partner with customers to design and deliver new features, and productize those features into our core platform. What You’ll Bring Relevant college and post-college experience in fast-moving, high-ownership environments. Strong customer-facing skills, with the ability to run discovery, extract requirements, and communicate clearly with both technical and non-technical stakeholders. Ownership mindset, treating each deployment as a mission-critical project. Hands-on engineer with proven proficiency in Python. High standards for technical documentation and cross-team communication. Comfortable working closely with customers and in a dynamic, iterative environment with evolving objectives. Ability to work from our San Francisco office four days per week (open to relocation). As an early-stage company building at the frontier of AI, we work with high intensity and commitment. While schedules can vary by role/team, many weeks will demand extra focus, flexibility and time particularly during major launches and high impact sprints. We're seeking those who are aligned to and able to commit to that expectation which includes 4 days per week in our San Francisco Office.

About Us We’re building the AI infrastructure powering the future of financial operations - starting with automating the most painful and complex workflows in loan servicing. Backed by a16z and Y Combinator, with $65M raised in Series A funding. 8-figure ARR < 2 years already serving > 20% of the auto lending industry, and processing millions of real customer calls and transactions daily. Fully deployed with major financial institutions - not just PoCs. We are expanding into new financial services segments! In-person office culture in San Francisco, CA. We're fully integrated with our customers, own the full stack, and are moving fast to bring modern AI into regulated industries where precision, reliability, and performance matter most. About the Role We're seeking a Software Engineer - Core Product to help us reshape how millions of loans are serviced through artificial intelligence. As a Product Engineer at Salient, you'll build and enhance our AI platform that automates and improves every aspect of loan servicing - from payment processing to fraud prevention to customer support. You will be responsible for both the 0→1 MVP development and the 1→10 growth and scaling of a product. You'll work directly on features that help lenders better serve their customers while improving compliance and reducing risk. Responsibilities Develop complete features across both frontend and backend layers of our application Write clean, maintainable, and efficient code with appropriate test coverage Troubleshoot and debug complex issues across the technology stack Optimize application performance and scalability Own both product manager and software engineer responsibilities Balance technical considerations with user needs and business goals Incorporate customer feedback into product and features Requirements 4+ years of software engineering experience Strong Python proficiency Proven track record of shipping user-focused products Excellence in cross-functional collaboration and communication Deep empathy for user needs and passion for user experience Enjoy being hacky - getting something out to the customer as soon as possible Experience building scalable systems We’re hiring for full stack and backend roles Ability to work 4 days a week from our San Francisco office (open to candidates willing to relocate) Nice to Have Experience in highly regulated industry Combination of both big tech and start-up experience Knowledge of auto loan servicing At Salient, we’re building at the edge of AI - fast, focused, and with real ownership. Sprints and major launches move quickly, and we look for people who are energized by that pace and ready to collaborate in person 4 days a week in our San Francisco office with a start time of 8:00 AM. We also offer a benefits package designed to support our full-time employees: medical, dental, and vision coverage, a generous 401(k), and catered lunches. By applying, you acknowledge that your personal information will be processed in accordance with our Privacy Policy.

About Us We’re building the AI infrastructure powering the future of financial operations - starting with automating the most painful and complex workflows in loan servicing. Backed by a16z and Y Combinator, with $65M raised in Series A funding. 8-figure ARR < 2 years already serving > 20% of the auto lending industry, and processing millions of real customer calls and transactions daily. Fully deployed with major financial institutions - not just PoCs. We are expanding into new financial services segments! In-person office culture in San Francisco, CA. We're fully integrated with our customers, own the full stack, and are moving fast to bring modern AI into regulated industries where precision, reliability, and performance matter most. What You'll Do Own full-cycle recruiting across technical roles from sourcing, screening, coordinating, and closing. Proactively source and engage engineering and technical talent (software, AI/ML, infrastructure) with high outbound volume. Move candidates through the process fast; we run lean stages and expect speed without sacrificing quality. Partner directly with the CEO and hiring managers to understand what great looks like for each role and calibrate quickly. Build and maintain a live pipeline; we expect sourced candidates flowing continuously, not in batches. Handle offers, negotiate, and close; we need a closer, not a coordinator. Identify gaps in process and fix them without being asked. Track recruiting metrics and maintain organized candidate records in ATS (Ashby). What We're Looking For 5+ years of full-cycle recruiting experience; startup experience required. Proven track record hiring engineers: software, AI/ML, or similar technical roles is non-negotiable. High-volume sourcer who can generate outbound pipeline consistently, not just reactively. Experience closing skeptical candidates; you know how to sell a vision and move people off the fence. Operates well with ambiguity, limited process, and a CEO who is deeply involved in hiring. You don't wait to be told what's broken - you fix it. Present in-office 4 days a week; this is a hands-on, in-person role. You'll Thrive Here If You've helped build an engineering team at an early-stage startup from the ground up. You're used to a founder-led hiring culture where speed and judgment matter more than process compliance. You're passionate about AI, startups, and what it takes to build a high-performing team. You're energized by high output, not managed by it. At Salient, we’re building at the edge of AI - fast, focused, and with real ownership. Sprints and major launches move quickly, and we look for people who are energized by that pace and ready to collaborate in person 4 days a week in our San Francisco office with a start time of 8:00 AM. We also offer a benefits package designed to support our full-time employees: medical, dental, and vision coverage , a generous 401(k), and catered lunches. By applying, you acknowledge that your personal information will be processed in accordance with our Privacy Policy.