Chief Technology Officer (CTO)

<h2><span><strong id="docs-internal-guid-a1073620-7fff-4b68-3ef4-0e3989a03974">About Kleos</strong></span></h2><p><span>Kleos is building a global platform for hiring, managing, and paying international teams. Our product combines global payroll, contractor management, payments, and compliance.</span></p><p><span>As Kleos expands across new markets, currencies, providers, and transaction flows, we are looking for a deeply technical, hands-on CTO to own the architecture and technical foundation of the product.</span></p><p><span>Kleos already has an established engineering and QA team responsible for building and developing the platform. We are not looking to add another management layer. We need a strong architect who can raise the technical bar, strengthen the existing team, and help us scale quickly and safely.</span></p><p><span>People leadership matters, but this is first and foremost a technical leadership role.</span></p><h2>What you’d own</h2><h3><span><strong id="docs-internal-guid-a1073620-7fff-4b68-3ef4-0e3989a03974">Architecture and technical strategy</strong></span></h3><ul><li><p><span>Enhance and evolve Kleos’ technical architecture and long-term technical strategy.</span></p></li><li><p><span>Assess the current system, identify critical risks and bottlenecks, and build a clear technical roadmap.</span></p></li><li><p><span>Design scalable and reliable systems for payments, payroll, external integrations, and sensitive financial data.</span></p></li><li><p><span>Make key architectural decisions that balance product speed, security, reliability, and maintainability.</span></p></li><li><p><span>Stay close to the codebase, review critical solutions, and step into complex engineering and production issues when needed.</span></p></li><li><p><span>Manage technical debt deliberately and prevent it from slowing down the business.</span></p></li></ul><h3><span><strong id="docs-internal-guid-a1073620-7fff-4b68-3ef4-0e3989a03974">Raise engineering quality</strong></span></h3><ul><li><p><span>Set clear standards for technical design, clean code, testing, code reviews, documentation, and release readiness.</span></p></li><li><p><span>Improve automated testing, observability, production stability, and development workflows.</span></p></li><li><p><span>Challenge weak technical decisions and help the team build better, more maintainable software.</span></p></li><li><p><span>Introduce lightweight and predictable engineering processes without unnecessary bureaucracy.</span></p></li></ul><h3><span><strong id="docs-internal-guid-a1073620-7fff-4b68-3ef4-0e3989a03974">Security and reliability</strong></span></h3><ul><li><p><span>Make security a core part of architecture and product development.</span></p></li><li><p><span>Strengthen access management, data protection, infrastructure security, logging, monitoring, and auditability.</span></p></li><li><p><span>Establish clear incident management, escalation, post-incident review, disaster recovery, and business continuity processes.</span></p></li><li><p><span>Work closely with Product, Operations, and Compliance in a regulated fintech environment.</span></p></li></ul><h3><span><strong id="docs-internal-guid-a1073620-7fff-4b68-3ef4-0e3989a03974">Build an AI-native engineering function</strong></span></h3><ul><li><p><span>Integrate AI into technical design, coding, code review, testing, documentation, debugging, and incident analysis.</span></p></li><li><p><span>Automate repetitive engineering and QA workflows.</span></p></li><li><p><span>Create practical standards for safe and effective AI-assisted development.</span></p></li><li><p><span>Measure the impact of AI on delivery speed, product quality, defects, and engineering efficiency.</span></p></li></ul><h3><span><strong id="docs-internal-guid-a1073620-7fff-4b68-3ef4-0e3989a03974">Lead and develop the team</strong></span></h3><ul><li><p><span>Set a high technical bar and improve ownership and decision-making across engineering.</span></p></li><li><p><span>Help developers and QA engineers grow through mentoring, feedback, and strong technical leadership.</span></p></li><li><p><span>Work closely with Product to turn business priorities into scalable technical solutions.</span></p></li><li><p><span>Identify capability gaps and help hire strong engineers as the company grows.</span></p></li></ul><h2><span><strong id="docs-internal-guid-a1073620-7fff-4b68-3ef4-0e3989a03974">What we are looking for</strong></span></h2><ul><li><p><span>10+ years of strong hands-on experience in software architecture and technical leadership.</span></p></li><li><p><span>Experience building or scaling fintech, payments, banking, payroll, or another transactional product.</span></p></li><li><p><span>Deep understanding of distributed systems, external integrations, infrastructure, security, and reliability.</span></p></li><li><p><span>Strong ability to perform deep code reviews, challenge architectural decisions, and solve complex production issues.</span></p></li><li><p><span>Experience working with sensitive financial and personal data.</span></p></li><li><p><span>Strong knowledge of testing, observability, incident management, and software quality.</span></p></li><li><p><span>Experience leading and developing engineering teams.</span></p></li><li><p><span>Practical experience using AI across the software development lifecycle, beyond basic code generation.</span></p></li><li><p><span>Strong product thinking and the ability to connect technical decisions with business outcomes.</span></p></li><li><p><span>Ability to introduce structure while keeping the organization fast and pragmatic.</span></p></li></ul><p><span>This role is not suitable for a management-only CTO. You should be comfortable going deep into architecture, code, infrastructure, security, and complex production issues.</span></p><h2><span><strong id="docs-internal-guid-a1073620-7fff-4b68-3ef4-0e3989a03974">Why join Kleos</strong></span></h2><ul><li><p><span>Own the architecture of a growing global fintech-HRtech product.</span></p></li><li><p><span>Solve complex challenges across payments, payroll, compliance, and financial infrastructure.</span></p></li><li><p><span>Have a direct impact on product strategy and company growth.</span></p></li><li><p><span>Strengthen and shape an established engineering function.</span></p></li><li><p><span>Build practical AI-native engineering processes with measurable results.</span></p></li><li><p><span>Combine deep technical work with real business impact.</span></p></li></ul>