Chakra Labs - Strategic Projects Lead
About the company
In collaboration with leading research teams, Chakra Labs builds deterministic, pixel-perfect reinforcement learning environments and trajectory datasets to push capability boundaries. 15 employees, founded 2025, $25M total funding, New York City.
Your tasks
Owning multi-project delivery from start to finish: tracking what each lab customer needs and making sure deliverables ship on time and meet a high quality bar
Finding, hiring, and managing pools of expert contributors who build gyms and trajectories, leading through influence rather than authority
Working with researchers to understand what matters most and prioritize milestones when requirements change overnight
Hands-on product work with engineers to shape the internal tools and workflows behind each deliverable
Checking trajectories, verifiers, and evals before they reach customers; telling truly useful work from work that only looks complete
Requirements
About this role We are looking for a Strategic Projects Lead with experience running complex, deadline-driven projects for customers, as an SPL or Deployment Strategist at a human-data lab, or in consulting, banking, or startup operations. You will own customer projects from start to finish, taking a vague research goal from a frontier AI lab and turning it into a dataset that researchers trust. This is one of the most operationally demanding roles at Chakra and the closest to the customer. Vibe coding a plus; high agency, sound judgment and excitement about AI data matter most.
1+ years in consulting, investment banking, or a fast-paced startup ops role (or SPL / Deployment Strategist at a human-data lab)
Experience running complex, deadline-driven customer projects
High agency, sound judgment, real excitement about AI data
What we offer
Compensation: $185,000-$205,000 base (up to $250K for senior candidates with deep experience) + 0.05%-0.15% equity + annual bonus if company hits targets.
Other
Source: Paraform - https://www.paraform.com/share/chakra-labs/cmuwyxp3i004r0cjg37pk3zts
Location: Hybrid, 3+ days in office in New York City or Seattle. Visa: open to transfers and new sponsorships (H1B, TN).
Tech stack RL Environments, Trajectories, Verifiers, Evals, Post-Training Data
Comfort with vibe coding a plus, not required Based in or able to work 3+ days/week in NYC or Seattle