Software Engineer (Trajectory)

Job Description

Mercor is hiring experienced Software Engineers to support high-impact research collaborations with leading AI labs. Freelancers will contribute to building training datasets that improve AI model reasoning and problem-solving on real-world coding tasks.

This is a unique opportunity to apply your software engineering expertise toward shaping the next generation of intelligent systems.

About the Project

You'll annotate frontier-model trajectories on SWE-bench–style tasks derived from real open-source repositories. Currently, closed-source models do not expose their internal reasoning traces, making it difficult to understand how LLMs approach problem-solving.

To address this gap, you'll reconstruct and annotate the reasoning portions of model trajectories—using your own problem-solving process and the full task context to infer and infill the underlying thought process at each step.

Key Responsibilities

• Review model-generated code trajectories on realistic software engineering tasks

• Reconstruct chain-of-thought reasoning that explains each step of the solution process

• Annotate decision points, debugging logic, and problem-solving strategies

• Use full task context (codebase, issue descriptions, test cases) to infer plausible reasoning

• Ensure annotations reflect realistic developer thought processes and technical accuracy

Ideal Qualifications

• 2+ years of experience in software engineering, with hands-on debugging and problem-solving in real codebases

• Degree in Software Engineering, Computer Science, or a related field (Bachelor's minimum; advanced degree preferred)

• Strong proficiency in Python, JavaScript, TypeScript, or other common languages found in open-source projects

• Familiarity with version control workflows (Git, PRs, issue tracking)

• Comfortable articulating technical reasoning in clear, structured writing

Project Timeline

• Start Date: Immediate

• Duration: 1–2 months

• Commitment: Part-time (15–25 hours/week, with flexibility up to 40 hours/week)

Application & Onboarding Process

• Upload your resume

• AI interview: A short, 15-minute conversational session to understand your background, experience, and interest in the role

• Follow-up communication within a few days with next steps and onboarding details

Apply today and leverage your software engineering expertise to help build the future of AI-driven systems!