At a Glance
- Tasks: Lead the development of multimodal capabilities in AI models, focusing on image input.
- Company: Join Poolside, a pioneering company aiming to achieve Artificial General Intelligence.
- Benefits: Enjoy fully remote work, flexible hours, and generous vacation time.
- Other info: Collaborative, inclusive culture with opportunities for personal and professional growth.
- Why this job: Shape the future of AI and make a real impact in software development.
- Qualifications: Experience in training production-grade VLMs and strong Python skills required.
The predicted salary is between 60000 - 80000 £ per year.
ABOUT POOLSIDE
In this decade, the world will create Artificial General Intelligence. There will only be a small number of companies who will achieve this. Their ability to stack advantages and pull ahead will define the winners. These companies will move faster than anyone else. They will attract the world's most capable talent. They will be on the forefront of applied research, engineering, infrastructure and deployment at scale. They will continue to scale their training to larger and more capable models. They will create powerful economic engines. They will obsess over the success of their users and customers.
Poolside exists to be this company: to build a world where AI will be the engine behind economically valuable work and scientific progress. We believe the fastest way to reach AGI lies in accelerating software development itself, by reshaping the developer experience with agentic systems, coding assistants, and the open-weight frontier models that power them.
ABOUT OUR TEAM
We were founded in the US and have our home there, but our team is distributed across Europe and North America. We get our fix of in-person collaboration in Paris each month for 3 days, always Monday-Wednesday, with an open invitation to stay the whole week. We also do longer off-sites once a year.
Our team is a multidisciplinary blend of research, engineering, and business experts. What unites us is our deep care for what we build together. We're in a race that requires hard work, intellectual curiosity, and obsession; to balance this intensity, we've assembled a team of low ego and kind-hearted individuals who have built the special culture Poolside has. By building collaboratively and with intention, we create a compounding effect that moves the entire company forward towards our mission: reaching AGI through intelligence systems built for software development.
ABOUT THE ROLE
You'll build a new team from the ground up, owning multimodality at Poolside: teaching our frontier coding model to see. Multimodality is becoming increasingly important in frontier models, and this is a chance to shape this capability in Poolside’s models from an early stage. To deliver it, you'll draw on our powerful model factory, thousands of GPUs, and our strong research team.
The near-term focus is image input — the capability most useful to SWE and general agents — reading a design and speccing it out, writing and verifying the code that makes that design real, understanding the plots and diagrams in a paper. You'll set the technical direction, starting with pragmatic adapter-based approaches and evolving toward native multimodality over time. You'll partner closely with teams inside Applied Research, and work in a newly-formed team alongside one of our talented founding engineers to bootstrap our multimodality efforts.
YOUR MISSION
To bring multimodality to Poolside's models, starting with image input and building toward native multimodal understanding.
RESPONSIBILITIES
- Own Poolside's multimodality direction and capability adoption
- Ship our first image-input capabilities
- Chart and drive the path from adapter-based to native multimodality
- Collaborate on custom evaluations and datasets for multimodal SWE capabilities
- Run experiments end to end: hypothesis, implementation, training at scale, analysis
- Partner with evals, architecture, data, and post-training teams to land multimodality in Poolside models
SKILLS & EXPERIENCE
- Experience in end-to-end training of production-grade VLMs
- Strong LLM training fundamentals: transformers and distributed training at scale
- Strong Python programming skills
- Pragmatic and high-ownership: you reach for the simplest thing that works and thrive in greenfield ambiguity
- Nice to have: Leadership and 0-1 experience, especially with substantial breadth, ownership, and hands-on contributions
- Distinguished research background on VLMs or multimodal models
- Understanding of the challenges of native multimodality
- Experience building agentic computer use systems
PROCESS
- Intro call with one of our Co-Heads of Applied Research
- Technical Interviews with Founding Engineers and Members of Engineering
- Team fit call with the People team
- Final interview with our Co-CEO and Co-Founder, Eiso
BENEFITS
- Fully remote work & flexible hours
- 37 days/year of vacation & holidays
- Health insurance allowance for you & dependents
- 16 weeks of flexible, full-pay parental leave
- Well-being, always-be-learning & home office allowances
- Company-provided equipment
- Frequent team get-togethers
- Diverse & inclusive people-first culture
Member of Engineering (Multimodality - Research Lead) employer: poolside
At Poolside, we are committed to fostering a dynamic and inclusive work environment that empowers our team members to thrive. With fully remote work options, generous vacation policies, and a strong focus on employee well-being, we ensure that our engineers can balance their professional ambitions with personal growth. Our unique culture, characterised by low ego and kindness, combined with regular team gatherings in vibrant locations like Paris, makes Poolside an exceptional place for those looking to make a meaningful impact in the world of AI and software development.
StudySmarter Expert Advice🤫
We think this is how you could land Member of Engineering (Multimodality - Research Lead)
✨Join Local Tech Meetups
Get out there and mingle with fellow developers by joining local tech meetups. It’s a fantastic way to meet people who might be working at poolside or know someone who does. Plus, you can pick up some trendy tech skills and trends while you're at it!
✨Contribute to Open Source Projects
Show off your coding chops by jumping into open-source projects. Not only does this give you practical experience, but it also gets you noticed in the dev community. You'll create a killer portfolio that speaks volumes about your skills to poolside.
✨Tap into Online Developer Communities
Don’t underestimate the power of online developer communities like GitHub, Stack Overflow, and even Reddit. Participate in discussions, share your projects, and build your visibility. We can often find opportunities through these channels that can lead to a full-time gig at companies like poolside.
✨Explore Job Boards Specifically for Tech Roles
Keep your eyes peeled on job boards that focus on tech roles. Sites like TechCareers or Stack Overflow Jobs can often have listings for companies like poolside that might not show up on broader job sites. Make it a habit to check these regularly, and don’t hesitate to apply directly through our website!
We think you need these skills to ace Member of Engineering (Multimodality - Research Lead)
Some tips for your application 🫡
Show off your coding skills:When applying for a software engineering role, it's super important to showcase your coding skills. Make sure your CV includes your tech stack, any relevant programming languages you’re comfortable with, and examples of projects you've worked on. If you have a GitHub profile, link it up! We love to see code in action.
Tailor your portfolio:For a full-time role, we’d expect to see some solid examples of your work in your portfolio. Make sure to include at least two or three projects that highlight your problem-solving skills and your ability to work with different technologies. Focus on the projects that are most relevant to the position at poolside.
Craft a killer cover letter:Your cover letter is your chance to stand out—make it personal! Explain why you want to work at poolside and how your skills align with the role. Show us your passion for software development. We dig enthusiastic candidates who understand the value of collaboration and continuous learning!
Be clear and concise:When it comes to writing your CV and cover letter, clarity is key. Avoid jargon that could confuse us and stick to simple, direct language. Highlight your achievements with quantifiable results where possible, and keep everything easy to read. A well-organised application goes a long way!
How to prepare for a job interview at poolside
✨Brush Up on Your Coding Skills
For a full-time software engineering role, it's crucial that we stay sharp with our coding abilities. Expect technical questions that might involve solving problems on the spot or discussing algorithms. Practise on platforms like LeetCode or HackerRank to get comfortable with the types of questions that often come up.
✨Know Your Tools and Frameworks
Make sure we’re well-acquainted with the tools and technologies listed in the job description. Familiarise ourselves with any specific frameworks or programming languages mentioned. If poolside uses React or Node.js, for instance, be ready to discuss how we’ve used them in previous projects or coursework.
✨Showcase Your Projects
Bring along a portfolio that highlights our best work. This could be code samples, GitHub repositories, or any side projects we’ve built. Make sure we can talk through our thought process for each project, especially the challenges we faced and how we solved them—this shows our problem-solving skills in action.
✨Prepare for Behavioural Questions
While technical skills are key, full-time positions also require cultural fit. Be ready to discuss our previous experiences and how we handle teamwork, conflict, and deadlines. Brush up on the STAR method—Situation, Task, Action, Result—to clearly articulate our past experiences when discussing how we've contributed to a team.
