AI Systems Builder / Automation Engineer / Full-Stack Dev

# Full-Stack AI Engineer to own the ScaleSage platform

Python, FastAPI, Next.js, Supabase. Remote. Part-time to start, with a written path to full-time and technical lead across the group.

## Who I am and what this is

I'm Jordan, a British founder based in Thailand. I run The Machine Collective (TMC): a group of ventures built on AI systems I design and my team ships. The main focus right now is ScaleSage, UK-based AI automation and client acquisition specialists for small and mid-sized businesses. Around it sit a Caribbean food brand heading into UK retail, a children's education app, a content production engine built to serve five brands, and internal research and trading systems.

I'm not a developer. I architect through conversation and Claude Code, and my team executes. My bottleneck is execution bandwidth, not ideas. I already have a strong EA in the Philippines. What I need now is her technical counterpart: the person who owns the code.

## The situation, straight

The ScaleSage platform is built and in production. The developer who built it is leaving on a planned notice period, and the handover is structured. You come in now, overlap with him while he's still here, take the platform over, finish it to a proven standard, and then build what comes next.

A lot exists. Some of it is documented better than the rest. The standard from here is simple: nothing is called done until it's demonstrated working, estimates are real and kept, and every hour is accounted for.

If that sounds like pressure, this isn't your role. If it sounds like how good engineering should work anyway, keep reading.

What I hire for, in order: finishing what you start; proving it works before you call it done; clear, precise written and spoken English, because nothing can get lost in translation here; being extremely organised; and an eye for detail, for design, and for what premium quality actually is. Our clients pay for premium and can tell the difference.

## What you'll inherit

Python/FastAPI services on Docker Compose on a Mac Mini production box behind Cloudflare Tunnels and Tailscale. Next.js front end on Vercel. Postgres on Supabase with Alembic migrations and row-level security. GitHub Actions CI gating deploys. Stripe with webhooks. Cold email through the Instantly and Apollo APIs, plus Hunter, Google Places and Companies House. A conversational diagnostic funnel and a partner commission engine. HeyGen and ElevenLabs for generated video and voice. An e-signature flow, scheduled jobs, LLM agents with per-run cost tracking, and Slack alerting.

All of it real. All of it in production today.

## What you'll actually do

The 30-day trial starts on day one and runs alongside the outgoing developer for the rest of his notice period, so you inherit the platform safely before he's gone.

In the trial:

- Take the handover repo by repo and service by service until you can change any of it safely, documenting what you find as you go.
- Close out what's in flight with evidence: outbound email, payments, the diagnostic funnel, partner tooling.
- Prove it. For every piece you touch, a short recorded walkthrough showing it working, not a message saying it does.

A candidate who takes clean ownership of the platform and closes out the handover meets the bar. One who backs every claim with a proven demo is doing this role well. One who also spots what's inefficient or under-specified and improves the plan is exceptional.

After the trial you own the platform and its scope. Next on ScaleSage: a client platform, a content production product, and a search and AI visibility product. All scoped, all yours to build.

Beyond ScaleSage, the rest of TMC as it needs you: the Belly Full Seasonings brand site and e-commerce, Legacy Curriculum education app builds, AI video, voice and persona production, the internal content factory that serves our own brands, dashboards and tools, and client systems as ScaleSage grows. This is not a phased roadmap. You're a TMC team member shipping what the business needs. Variety is the deal.

## How we work

- A daily written end-of-day report: completed, active, blocked, next, with hours.
- Four status words for all work: architected, coded, live, proven. Only the last one counts as done.
- One live demonstration call a week, working things shown on screen, plus short recorded walkthroughs.
- Blockers raised the same day they appear.
- Time tracked through an agreed tool.
- Any other client work disclosed in writing before it starts.
- Written and async by default. You propose your fixed weekly windows and we agree them, with at least three hours a day of overlap with Bangkok and Manila working hours.

## The path

Nothing here is promised. Everything is earned. The path is written into the contract: part-time to prove the fit, expanded part-time as you deliver, full-time when the business and your delivery earn it, then technical lead across the group's ventures, hiring the people beneath you. Full-time follows delivery, not time served.

Bonuses are paid for execution: when you ship a big build, solve a complex problem, or hit a real milestone. Pay rises are earned through consistency, reliability and loyalty over time.

The money, straight: $600 a month for a fixed 20 hours a week to start, through the trial and into the part-time retainer. I'm a founder, not a corporation. I pay what I can afford now and grow it as the business grows, and the ladder above is how that happens.

I won't sell you a dream. I'll tell you the ceiling is high for the right person.

## What you get

- Real freedom in how and when you work, inside the windows we agree.
- A direct line to the founder. Decisions in hours, not weeks. No red tape.
- Claude Code and Codex provided as your daily tools.
- Ownership. No product manager sitting between you and the work.
- Variety across ventures instead of one narrow codebase.
- Paid monthly in arrears, on time, every time, by Wise or crypto (USDT or USDC on the network of your choice).
- Trips to Thailand for in-person workshops, expenses covered.
- A company that wants you to grow into leading its technology.

## Must have

- Python and FastAPI in production
- Postgres and Supabase: schema design and migrations, background jobs and schedulers, webhooks
- Next.js and React on Vercel, Tailwind, responsive layouts that look right on a phone, CSS animation and motion, and the ability to take a Figma or visual reference and build it to the pixel
- Stripe subscriptions and one-off payments, REST integration with third-party SaaS
- Email sending and deliverability
- Docker, CI pipelines, Linux, Cloudflare Tunnels, backups and restore, secrets handled properly
- LLM APIs, prompt and agent design, evaluation of outputs
- AI-native: you use Claude Code, Cursor or similar every day, and you can tell when they're wrong
- Automated tests, QA on real devices, security and data-protection basics
- Documentation good enough that someone else could take over
- Excellent written and spoken English. You'll write daily reports and speak on a weekly demo call. English is tested live on the screening call.
- Self-managing: able to take a brief and ship without hand-holding
- Reliable internet and a quiet workspace

If you're strong in most of these and honest about the rest, apply.

## Nice to have

- Experience taking over an existing, under-documented codebase and making it safe to change
- Background in a client-services environment where "done" has to be provable to someone else
- Content production tooling, or SEO and AI-search-visibility work
- Working knowledge of UK GDPR and PECR as they apply to cold email: suppression, unsubscribe handling, eligibility
- AI voice agents (Vapi, Retell, ElevenLabs) and AI image and video tools (Runway, Flux, HeyGen, Higgsfield)
- RAG and vector databases (pgvector or similar)
- An active GitHub with public commits in the last 90 days
- An entrepreneurial mindset: you've tried to build something yourself
- Willingness to travel to Thailand, and openness to relocating long-term if the fit is right

You don't need to know everything already. But you need to be the kind of person who can learn a new tool fast, build with it, and document what you did so the rest of the team can use it.

## How to apply

Start your message with the word PROVEN, so I know you read this properly.

Then send:

1. A recorded video, under three minutes: why this role, and how you'd approach the first week. No script needed. I want to see how you think and hear how you speak.

2. Answers to these seven questions, written directly in your application. Real examples only. Generic answers are exactly what this is screening against.
1. Describe a system you built end to end and are proud of: the stack, what it does, what's live today, and what you'd do differently.
2. Have you taken over someone else's system? What were you handed, what was missing, and how did you get to the point of being able to change it safely?
3. Give an example of a deadline you missed. When did you tell the client, what did you say, and what changed afterwards?
4. Describe something you shipped that later turned out not to work in production. How was it found, and what did you change so it wouldn't happen again?
5. What is your current client load in hours per week, and what fixed windows could you give this role, in Bangkok time?
6. Send a link to something you've built where the front end is yours, and tell me one thing about it you'd fix if you had an hour.
7. You'll have Claude Code and Codex. How do you use them, and how do you know what they produce is right?

3. Your GitHub username and a link to your portfolio.

4. Confirmation you can start at the $600 retainer for 20 hours a week, or your number with the reason. Plus your full-time rate and your earliest start date.

5. One thing you'd push back on or improve in this brief. It shows me you think, not just execute.

6. One question for me about the role, the company, or me.

If your answer to question four is "that has never happened to me", this isn't the role for you. If you used AI to help write your application, say which tool. I respect AI use. I don't respect pretending. Applications missing any of the above are not read.

## Process

Written screen, then a 30-minute video call where English is tested live and you screen-share one production system you built, then a short technical test, then two client references, then a contract with a 30-day trial.

We're hiring now. The trial starts as soon as the right person is found, while the current developer is still here to hand over.

J W-Blake
Founder, The Machine Collective