Chief Scientist
Remote•April 3, 2025
About Trail of BitsTrail of Bits helps secure the world’s most targeted organizations and products. We combine high-end security research with a real-world attacker mentality to reduce risk and fortify code.As a cybersecurity research and consulting firm, we serve clients in the defense, tech, finance, and blockchain industries. We help with their most difficult security challenges by designing and building new technology, researching new techniques to advance the state of practice, and reviewing the security of the latest available technology products before they hit the market.Our team consumes, produces, and presents research as a natural part of doing business. When we make new discoveries or developments, we strive to share our knowledge and release our tools as open-source. It’s a practice that’s earned us industry accolades and helped contribute to our double-digit bottom-line growth.RoleWe are looking for a Chief Scientist to provide technical leadership across the organization, particularly in and between our assurance and research practices. You will be responsible for leading the development and dissemination of technology techniques to solve Trail of Bits’ business and technological challenges. You will work with employees, stakeholders, and customers to ensure our code review, security engineering, and applied research processes and practices are effective, efficient, and secure. Strategic thinking and strong security acumen, particularly in software security and programming language theory are essential in this role. We expect you to be well-versed in current technology trends and familiar with a variety of cybersecurity business concepts in order to communicate where we sit and aspirationally could innovate and lead within the industry.
Responsibilities
- Oversee all company technical operations to ensure they produce the desired results and are consistent with the overall strategy and mission.
- Make high-quality technology-led decisions to improve our standing against competitors and meet customer needs.
- Analyze complex technological situations and provide solutions to ensure company success, differentiation, and growth.
- Provide technical leadership across the organization.
- Lead and mentor our teams in our assurance and research practices. Have an understanding of their projects and workflow and act as a point of escalation for clients.
- Inspire our team to execute and deliver high-performing technology practices.
- Directly manage our middle management leads.
- Develop the company's technology strategy, standard practices, and resources.
- Contribute to our overall roadmap and trajectory.
- Ensure internal software and technologies are used efficiently, profitably, and securely.
- Discover, evaluate, and implement new infrastructure and systems in partnership with IT.
- Decide and carry out the implementation of new resources and sunsetting old ones.
- Elevate our projects and connect them to industry gaps.
- Maintain a deep knowledge of the competitive landscape, market, and cybersecurity industry.
Requirements
- Proven experience as CTO or Chief Scientist or other managerial or leadership position
- Deep understanding and familiarity with the cybersecurity industry
- An effective manager and an inspiring leader
- Entrepreneurial mindset with outstanding organizational and leadership skills
- A startup mentality with a bias to action and the ability to flex in a fast-paced environment
- Prior experience working remotely. Strong personal organizational skills and a love for self-time management
- Understanding of budgets, forecasting and business planning
- Analytical abilities and problem-solving skills
- Excellent communication and public speaking skills
- Must live in the United States or Canada
Company Perks
- Before, during and after COVID-19, our workforce works flexibly. Many employees choose to work from home around the globe. As long as you deliver against your goals, we encourage you to harness your personal working style to let you work best.
- Liberal expense policy for acquiring the equipment and software that help you do your job. If we need hardware to work effectively, we buy it.
- We offer exceptional and tailored technical, leadership, and organizational training for our team members. Everyone is encouraged to identify additional opportunities for personal professional growth with working at Trail of Bits.
- We routinely highlight the amazing work our employees do via our blog, product offerings, and conference talks. We celebrate you!
- We're at the forefront of a number of markets and have the internal expertise and the ambition to capitalize on those opportunities. Our employees see their work in use and valued by many others.
Benefits for US Employees
- Multiple generous health, vision, and dental insurance plans including no-monthly-premium options supporting individuals and families through JustWorks
- Ancillary benefits including life and disability insurance, pre-tax commuter benefits, free Citi Bike membership, access to a HealthAdvocate, a healthcare Flexible Spending Account (FSA), and a free One Medical membership
- 3-4 months paid parental leave
- 401k with 5% company matching through Betterment
- Moving expenses: $5,000k one-time
- Charitable donations matching up to $2,000
- One time $1,000 at home office expense stipend
- $500/year personal learning & development budget
- Executive coaching for managers and above
- Options for coworking space (some restrictions may apply)
- Bonuses for recruiting, public speaking, tool releases, blog posts, academic posters, proposals, and whitepapers, and end-of-year bonuses based on company, team, and personal performance
- 20 days of Paid Time Off (PTO) per year
- 14 company holidays per year
- Carbon offsets for your personal and corporate carbon emissions through Project Wren
- Personal information privacy protection service subscription through DeleteMe
Benefits for Canadian Employees
- Premium health, vision, and dental insurance plans
- Life/AD&D Insurance options, as well as short- and long-term disability insurance plans
- 14 paid company holidays, including provincial statutory holidays and select US holidays
- 2 weeks of Paid Time Off (PTO) and 2 weeks of sick time per year
- RRSP plan with 5% company matching
- Annual charitable donation matching up to $2,000
- Bonuses for recruiting, public speaking, tool releases, blog posts, academic posters, proposals, and whitepapers, and end-of-year bonuses based on company, team, and personal performance
- Carbon offsets for your personal and corporate carbon emissions through Project Wren