Founding Growth

Shipd is our gamified data collection platform where contributors take on quests, bounties, and challenges that feel like an engaging and addictive experience. 16,000+ engineers have signed up organically, and now we need a Founding Growth hire to scale this community into the engine that powers frontier AI labs.

Your mission: solve the supply-side scaling problem --getting more sign ups, convert signups into engaged, retained contributors, build systems that multiply output, and create the “data flywheel” where contributors are so motivated they bring their friends.

• Scale the contributor base: Recruit specialized talent (e.g., cybersecurity, ML, domain experts) through creative, non-traditional channels.

• Convert signups into active contributors: Build onboarding funnels, training systems, and engagement loops for complex, hours-long tasks.

• Build retention systems: Keep top contributors engaged through competitions, leaderboards, recognition, and community dynamics.

• Design community infrastructure: Promote contributors to trainers/reviewers, run challenges, and make the ecosystem self-reinforcing.

• Engineer incentives: Go beyond payments—design viral referral mechanics, gamification, and status-driven rewards.

• Be data-driven: Build contributor lifecycle tracking, run cohort analyses, and design A/B tests for engagement and retention features.

• Scale operations: Develop 0→1 playbooks, hire community managers, and handle white-glove delivery for lab contracts while automating long-term systems.

• Experience growing two-sided marketplaces, consumer apps with high friction, developer products, creator economies, or gig/freelancer platforms (supply-side bias).

• A track record of building engaged communities— developer ecosystems, or competitive programming platforms.

• Comfort with data analysis (cohorts, funnels, retention metrics) and building lightweight systems.

• Run growth hacks that are highly creative and being able to make decisions from intuition in the early days when not much data is available to draw conclusions

• Ability to design scalable processes—from onboarding to QA to contributor promotions.

• Strong product sense for human motivation and psychology; you think in systems of incentives.

• Willingness to work hands-on: sourcing talent, running community experiments, and jumping into ops.

• Scrappy, creative executor who thrives on unconventional channels and tactics.

• Comfortable working 70+ hours in-office with high ownership.

• Equity-motivated, excited to build a foundational system for AI progress.

• Fast mover: prefers testing ideas live over long planning cycles.

• Experience in gamification, hackathons, or developer competitions.

• Background in community-led platforms or marketplaces with strong supply-side dynamics.

• Familiarity with QA systems, contributor assessments, or technical training funnels.

• You’re a traditional marketer focused on ads and brand campaigns.

• You’ve only worked in big tech with large budgets and teams.

• You don’t understand developer/technical talent motivation.

• You need structured processes and research cycles before acting.