---
title: 'Agent Engineering Manager at Tolan'
canonical: 'https://feeny.ai/job/agent-engineering-manager-tolan-san-francisco-gh5a43rfd2bt'
type: 'job'
last_seen: '2026-09-10'
---

# Agent Engineering Manager at Tolan

- **Company:** Tolan
- **Location:** San Francisco, CA
- **Compensation:** $200k–$300k
- **Employment:** full-time
- **Work type:** onsite
- **Posted:** 2026-01-29
- **Last confirmed live:** 2026-09-10
- **Apply:** https://jobs.ashbyhq.com/tolan/6bab2d98-e16b-44bc-9257-5949b4c0162e/application

**Skills:** AI coding assistants, Agent orchestration, Software engineering, Agent orchestration tooling, AI-assisted development workflows, Multi-step agent systems

> The Agent Engineering Manager designs and operates complex agent orchestration systems, delegating tasks to AI agents and reviewing their output. This role focuses on breaking down ambiguous problems, developing patterns for human-agent collaboration, and shipping product features through agent-assisted development.

## Job description

Tolan is building personal AI that helps people think, reflect, and take action in their real lives. We're an experienced team that previously founded Even, acquired for $300M in 2022. Tolan is backed by the designers and founders behind Instagram, Retro, Behance, Vimeo, and Notion.

## The Role

We're hiring an Agent Engineering Manager to break down ambiguous problems, delegate to agents, review their work critically, and course-correct when things go sideways. This isn't a management position — you won't have direct reports. But you'll need every skill that made you a great engineering manager. You'll design and operate complex agent orchestration systems, develop patterns for human-agent collaboration, and ship real product features primarily through agent-assisted development. This is a role we're creating for the first time as of January 2026. Over the past 3 months we've observed a step-function change in the reliability and capabilities of long-running AI agents. We've re-oriented our own work around this new reality, and our most effective engineers now spend more time orchestrating agents than writing code directly. We're certainly not the only people adjusting to this new reality — [Karpathy's recent thoughts](https://x.com/karpathy/status/2015883857489522876)resonate with what we've been experiencing.

## What You'll Do

- Break down ambiguous product problems into concrete, well-scoped tasks for agents to execute.
- Delegate to AI agents, review their output critically, and course-correct when things go sideways.
- Design and operate complex agent orchestration systems that ship real product features.
- Develop and document patterns for effective human-agent collaboration across the team.
- Help Tolan's engineering practice evolve as the capabilities of long-running agents continue to improve.

Who We're Looking For

- Experienced engineer. You have 5+ years of software engineering experience, with meaningful time spent in engineering management or tech lead roles.
- Skilled delegator. You know how to scope work and give feedback that improves output — skills honed managing people, now applied to agents.
- Hands-on with AI. You have direct experience with AI coding assistants and agent orchestration.
- Strong opinions. You know when to use agents and when to do it yourself.
- Thrives in ambiguity. You have a knack for turning fuzzy goals into concrete, executable tasks.
- Agent-first mindset. You genuinely enjoy the "managing agents" workflow and see it as the future of building.

Bonus points if you:

- Have built or contributed to agent orchestration tooling.
- Have written publicly about AI-assisted development workflows.
- Have experience with long-running, multi-step agent systems.
- Left management because you missed building, but still miss the parts of management that were about clarity and leverage.

Compensation: $200,000-300,000 base salary + equity + benefits

## About Tolan

## Company Overview
- **One-liner**: Tolan builds an AI-powered virtual alien friend that provides emotional support and companionship for everyday people.
- **Entity Type**: Private (Series A; $30M total funding)
- **Headquarters**: San Francisco, California, United States
- **Founded**: Not publicly disclosed (public launch February 2025)
- **Founders**: Quinten Farmer (CEO), Evan Goldschmidt (CTO), Ajay Mehta (President)

## Core Business
- **Primary industry**: AI companionship / Consumer AI / Emotional wellness technology
- **Target customers**: B2C – individuals seeking emotional support, companionship, and personal growth through an AI friend
- **Mission or purpose**: To give every person on Earth access to their own personal AGI – a trusted AI companion ([tolans.com](https://www.tolans.com/))

## Products & Services
- **Tolan App**: A voice-first, embodied AI companion presented as a cute alien friend. Users can talk, interact, and build a relationship with the AI. The product emphasizes character design, low-latency voice interaction, and emotional attunement. It is available as a mobile app with a 4.8-star rating ([tolans.com](https://www.tolans.com/)). More than 100,000 paying subscribers and over 2 million hours spent with Tolan companions ([nextplayso.substack.com](https://nextplayso.substack.com/p/should-you-join-tolan)).

## Market Standing
- **Valuation/Market Cap**: Not disclosed
- **Key Metric**: $12M ARR (as of early 2025) and $30M total funding ($10M seed led by Lachy Groom in Feb 2025, $20M Series A led by Khosla Ventures in Aug 2025) ([linkedin.com](https://www.linkedin.com/company/tolans); [nextplayso.substack.com](https://nextplayso.substack.com/p/should-you-join-tolan))
- **Notable Investors/Partners**: Khosla Ventures, Lachy Groom, Nat Friedman, Daniel Gross, Mike Krieger (Instagram co-founder), and founders of Notion, Replit, and more ([tolans.com](https://www.tolans.com/))
- **Growth Signals**: 
  - Over 100,000 paying subscribers and 130,000+ user reviews ([tolans.com](https://www.tolans.com/))
  - Employee headcount grew ~70% YoY (from ~23 to 38) ([linkedin.com](https://www.linkedin.com/company/tolans))
  - Viral organic growth driven by social media marketing ([nextplayso.substack.com](https://nextplayso.substack.com/p/should-you-join-tolan))

## Competitive Advantages
- **Emotional impact**: 85.6% of users said Tolan helped them through an emotionally difficult experience; 72.5% said it helped manage or improve a relationship ([tolans.com](https://www.tolans.com/))
- **Research-backed design**: Founded by a Board Certified Behavior Analyst and Vanderbilt doctoral researcher, bringing evidence-based approaches to AI companionship ([tolans.com](https://www.tolans.com/))
- **Mature culture & veteran team**: Core team previously built (and sold) Even to Walmart; low ego, direct communication, no politics ([nextplayso.substack.com](https://nextplayso.substack.com/p/should-you-join-tolan))
- **AI-native engineering**: Encourages use of AI tools in the interview process and in daily work, reflecting a pragmatic, high-velocity development approach ([tolans.com/relay](https://tolans.com/relay/how-we-hire-engineers-when-ai-writes-our-code))

## Strategic Focus
- **Scale responsibly**: Moving from a successful consumer app toward “giving every person access to their own personal AGI” while avoiding short-term monetization that harms users ([nextplayso.substack.com](https://nextplayso.substack.com/p/should-you-join-tolan))
- **Deepen embodiment & interactivity**: Continued investment in character design, voice AI (GPT‑5.1), and emotional intelligence systems ([tolans.com](https://www.tolans.com/))
- **Hire for judgment and pace**: Prioritizing engineers and creatives who can balance AI-generated code with human oversight and ship fast without sacrificing quality ([tolans.com/relay](https://tolans.com/relay/how-we-hire-engineers-when-ai-writes-our-code))

## Why Work Here
- **Culture**: Described as “the calmest culture I’ve ever seen” – direct, low-ego, drama-free, with a focus on doing great work quickly ([nextplayso.substack.com](https://nextplayso.substack.com/p/should-you-join-tolan))
- **Work environment**: In-person in San Francisco; small, veteran team (~38 people) where every hire makes a significant impact ([tolans.com](https://www.tolans.com/careers); [linkedin.com](https://www.linkedin.com/company/tolans))
- **Engineering philosophy**: AI tools are fully embraced – candidates are evaluated on how they use AI to build, and daily work is heavily AI-augmented. Engineers are expected to own the output, not just the code ([tolans.com/relay](https://tolans.com/relay/how-we-hire-engineers-when-ai-writes-our-code))
- **Perks/Notes**: Not explicitly listed; the focus is on meaningful work, long hours when needed but a marathon mindset, and a fun, intelligent team ([nextplayso.substack.com](https://nextplayso.substack.com/p/should-you-join-tolan))

## Sources
1. [tolans.com – Company Overview](https://www.tolans.com/)
2. [tolans.com – Careers Page](https://www.tolans.com/careers)
3. [linkedin.com – Tolan Company Profile](https://www.linkedin.com/company/tolans)
4. [nextplayso.substack.com – “Should you join: Tolan”](https://nextplayso.substack.com/p/should-you-join-tolan)
5. [tolans.com/relay – “How We Hire Engineers When AI Writes Our Code”](https://tolans.com/relay/how-we-hire-engineers-when-ai-writes-our-code)

## Other roles at Tolan

- [Lead Technical Recruiter](https://feeny.ai/job/lead-technical-recruiter-tolan-san-francisco-r0s9epp4xvba) — San Francisco, CA
- [Office Operations Manager](https://feeny.ai/job/office-operations-manager-tolan-san-francisco-pdv4c4x6x862) — San Francisco, CA
- [Senior Brand Designer](https://feeny.ai/job/senior-brand-designer-tolan-san-francisco-1pvse10jybzn) — San Francisco, CA
- [Principal Designer](https://feeny.ai/job/principal-designer-tolan-san-francisco-87bs0v6y7pts) — San Francisco, CA
- [Principal Gameplay Engineer - Unity](https://feeny.ai/job/principal-gameplay-engineer-unity-tolan-san-francisco-jey12agbyzgm) — San Francisco, CA
- [Backend Product Engineer](https://feeny.ai/job/backend-product-engineer-tolan-san-francisco-z4m11bx650h4) — San Francisco, CA
- [iOS Product Engineer](https://feeny.ai/job/ios-product-engineer-tolan-san-francisco-34jj0nnck054) — San Francisco, CA