Y Combinator 
Techstars Product Engineer
Description
Company Description
Lance (YC W26) develops autonomous AI agents that handle calls, close sales, and manage operations, enabling your team to focus on providing excellent guest experiences. Trusted by leading hotel groups across the U.S., Lance supports 50+ hotels with brands like Marriott, Hilton, and Hyatt. Combining AI agents with an all-in-one operating system for hotels covering front desk, housekeeping, maintenance, and sales, Lance integrates seamlessly with existing hotel software to make real-time decisions and efficiently manage complex tasks.
The role
As a Product Engineer, you'll own features end to end: talk to hotel operators, scope the problem, and ship production code across our agent platform and hotel OS. You'll work directly with our CEO and CTO in a small, fast, in-person team.
What you'll do
Design, build, and ship full-stack product features used daily by hotel staff and guests
Build and improve AI agent workflows (voice/call handling, workflow automation, integrations with hotel systems)
Turn customer feedback into product decisions and iterate quickly
Own quality, reliability, and performance of what you ship
What we're looking for
Degree (or graduating soon) in CS, engineering, or a related field, or equivalent experience
Strong programming fundamentals; experience building real projects (internships, startups, open source, hackathons)
Product sense and comfort talking directly to users
Interest in AI/LLM applications; hospitality or SaaS experience is a plus
Excited to work in person in San Francisco at an intense early-stage pace
Compensation & benefits
$150K–$250K salary + equity + bonus · health, vision & dental insurance · free in-office meals
Skills
As published by ashby · 10 questions · 1 written answer
Basics
Name, Email, Resume
Short answers (4)
- Phone Number
- Where are you currently located?
- When can you start?
Pick from a list (5)
- Are you willing to work 996?
- Are you willing to work in the San Francisco office?
- Are you authorized to work in the country where the job is located?
- Will you now or in the future require sponsorship for employment visa status in this country?
- I hereby certify that I have not knowingly withheld any information that might adversely affect my chances for employment and that the answers given by me are true and correct to the best of my knowledge. I further certify that I, the undersigned applicant, have personally completed this application. I understand that, to the extent permitted by applicable law, any omission or misstatement of material fact on this application or on any document used to secure employment shall be grounds for rejection of this application or for immediate discharge if I am employed, regardless of the time elapsed before discovery. Lance is not seeking, nor should you disclose, any information that may be subject to confidentiality obligations to third parties, including but not limited to, your current employer.
Written answers (1)
- At Lance, our mission is to automate hotel operations. We believe this starts with our own work. Describe a manual, broken, or low-value process from a previous role that you found frustrating. Then, briefly outline the system or tool you would build to eliminate it entirely.