Instacart
Grocery Technology
SeniorEngineeringManager,Search
Neural analysis suggests this role is
optimal for Manager candidates.
“Senior Engineering Manager, Search at Instacart. Skills: Search, Ranking, Machine Learning, Engineering Management. Lead senior engineering team. Grow senior engineering team”
What You'll Achieve.
Drive top-line growth; Double experimentation velocity
Industry & Context.
Reason through tradeoffs
What They're Looking For.
Must Have
4+ years engineering management experience, 10+ years total engineering experience, Experience building/leading search systems, Experience building/leading recommendation systems, Experience building/leading ranking systems, Experience building/leading applied ML systems, Familiarity with modern retrieval techniques, Familiarity with neural retrieval, Familiarity with semantic retrieval, Familiarity with ANN, Familiarity with LLM query understanding, Familiarity with LLM re-ranking, Technical depth in machine learning, Technical depth in large-scale distributed backend, Track record driving complex technical programs, Demonstrated product judgment, Demonstrated business judgment, Communication and stakeholder management skills
Nice to Have
Experience with ranking at scale, Experience with personalization at scale, Experience with multi-stage rankers, Experience with multi-task deep models, Experience with embeddings, Experience with real-time features, Experience with session-based features, Experience operating low-latency services, Experience operating high-throughput services, Experience with strict SLAs, On-call and reliability ownership experience, Experience leading 0→1 product area, Experience driving alignment across teams, Experience working with LLMs in production, Experience with experimentation/A-B testing, Exposure to two-sided marketplaces, Exposure to e-commerce, Exposure to ads-adjacent ranking problems
What You'll Do.
Lead senior engineering team
Grow senior engineering team
Partner with embedded MLEs
Partner with ML leads
Own team's technical strategy
Drive top-line growth
Hold strict quality bar
Champion LLMs in search
Partner with platform team
Design next-generation search retrieval
Ship next-generation search retrieval
Manage latency tradeoffs
Manage reliability tradeoffs
Double experimentation velocity
Invest in AI-native debugging tooling
Invest in ML foundations
Partner with ML teams
Partner with Product teams
Partner with Data Science teams
Partner with Home Platform teams
Partner with Discovery Platform teams
Partner with Ads organization
Partner with whitelabel retailer teams
Translate ranking changes
Build inclusive team culture
Build high-trust team culture
Roll up sleeves on technical decisions
Roll up sleeves on architectural decisions
How You'll Work.
Team & Collaboration
Cross-functional teams; ML teams; Product teams; Data Science teams; Platform teams; Ads organization; Retailer teams
Communication Scope
Bridging technical partners; Bridging non-technical partners
Process & Methodology
Roadmap, Strategy, Execution, Technical programs
Full Job Description
We're transforming the grocery industry At Instacart, we invite the world to share love through food because we believe everyone should have access to the food they love and more time to enjoy it together. Where others see a simple need for grocery delivery, we see exciting complexity and endless opportunity to serve the varied needs of our community. We work to deliver an essential service that customers rely on to get their groceries and household goods, while also offering safe and flexible earnings opportunities to Instacart Personal Shoppers. Instacart has become a lifeline for millions of people, and we’re building the team to help push our shopping cart forward. If you’re ready to do the best work of your life, come join our table. Instacart is a Flex First team There’s no one-size fits all approach to how we do our best work. Our employees have the flexibility to choose where they do their best work—whether it’s from home, an office, or your favorite coffee shop—while staying connected and building community through regular in-person events. Learn more about our flexible approach to where we work. Overview Instacart is the leading grocery technology company in North America, partnering with more than 1,800 retail banners to provide online shopping, delivery and pickup services from more than 100,000 stores. Search is the single most important way customers find and add products to their cart, and Cross-Retailer Search is how we help people decide not just what to buy, but where to shop. Together they sit at the top of the discovery funnel, where improvements in relevance and ranking compound directly into conversion, retailer engagement, and growth. We are standing up a dedicated Search engineering team and are looking for a seasoned engineering leader to run it. You will own the strategy and execution for Single-Retailer Search (SRS), Cross-Retailer Search (XRS), search suggestions and typeahead, and the whitelabel search we provide to Storefront Pro retail
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