Who we are
Contra Labs is a human-centered research lab studying how creatives actually use AI, how tools can serve creative work better, and how to protect the originality that gets flattened as everything starts to look the same.
We connect a global network of top creative talent with frontier AI labs and product companies. By grounding our research in real creative workflows, we help define what \"good\" looks like across design, video, imagery, and beyond. Our work powers benchmarking, evaluation, and post-training for leading models and applications. Built on Contra, the professional network for independent creatives, we turn human judgment into the training and evaluation layer that helps these tools serve the people who use them.
Why this role exists
We are scaling across client engagements: post-training dataset creation, benchmarking programs, and ongoing evaluation partnerships. Each project spans a different mix of AI labs, creative-tool companies, and research teams, with different requirements, timelines, and quality bars. We need someone to own this work from end to end.
Think of yourself as the operator for a project or vertical. You sit between three groups that do not naturally talk to each other: the client who needs the data, the creative experts producing it, and the internal engineering team building the tooling. Your job is to make all three feel like they are working on the same thing, and to ship results that are both rigorous and genuinely useful.
What you'll own
The methodology. Annotation protocols, rubrics, and evaluation designs for creative and multimodal outputs.
Delivery. Scope, evaluator staffing, quality routing, timelines, and the client relationship, from kickoff to final readout.
Quality. Data quality, inter-rater reliability, and real-time course correction when something feels off. You hold the bar, and you hold the levers to fix it.
Analysis and storytelling. Qualitative and quantitative analysis turned into clear findings, recommendations, reports, and workshops that clients act on.
The systems behind it. You turn repeated work into clean, measurable process, and you partner with engineering on the tooling that makes that process faster and more reliable.
The narrative. Case studies and benchmark publications that sharpen how Contra Labs is understood in the market.
About you
You design studies for a living. You can scope a question, run the study, analyze the data, and translate it into a direction people can act on.
You understand good creative, and you can explain it. You recognize creative quality and can say why, and you can tell the difference between personal preference and something closer to ground truth. You build frameworks that capture that signal faithfully.
You care more about people than about technology for its own sake. You understand how humans judge creative work and design systems around that.
You turn messy work into machines. You make process clear, predictable, and measurable, and you run a tight ship across several projects at once.
High ownership, low ego, bias to action. You ship a v1, learn, and do what it takes to deliver.
Experience
3+ years designing studies, running evaluations, analyzing data, and presenting findings.
Experience with data labeling, annotation, human-in-the-loop systems, or AI and ML evaluation workflows.
A track record managing several concurrent projects, including annotation, evaluation, or QA work.
A real point of view on creative quality and what \"good\" looks like.
Bonus
A strong research background, qualitative and quantitative. A Master's or PhD in HCI, cognitive science, psychology, design research, or a related field is a plus, and so is equivalent depth from industry.
Statistical methods for evaluation work: inter-rater reliability, sampling, regression, significance testing.
RLHF, LLM evaluation, or benchmark design.
Ethnography, UX research, or design-study methods.
Startup or 0-to-1 experience.
Requirements
Based in NYC. In office 5 days a week (Williamsburg).
Total comp
Salary: $150,000 to $200,000 USD plus equity
Medical, dental, vision
401k matching
Company laptop on your start date
Interview process
Recruiting team (20 minutes)
CEO and co-founder (30 minutes)
Technical interview, research and methods focus (45 minutes)
VP of Product (45 minutes)
Paid case study and presentation (60 minutes)
Note: Contra communicates with applicants through contra.com domains only. We never ask candidates for money. For current postings, visit Contra Careers.
","descriptionPlain":"Who we are\n\nContra Labs is a human-centered research lab studying how creatives actually use AI, how tools can serve creative work better, and how to protect the originality that gets flattened as everything starts to look the same.\n\nWe connect a global network of top creative talent with frontier AI labs and product companies. By grounding our research in real creative workflows, we help define what \"good\" looks like across design, video, imagery, and beyond. Our work powers benchmarking, evaluation, and post-training for leading models and applications. Built on Contra, the professional network for independent creatives, we turn human judgment into the training and evaluation layer that helps these tools serve the people who use them.\n\n\n\nWhy this role exists\n\nWe are scaling across client engagements: post-training dataset creation, benchmarking programs, and ongoing evaluation partnerships. Each project spans a different mix of AI labs, creative-tool companies, and research teams, with different requirements, timelines, and quality bars. We need someone to own this work from end to end.\n\nThink of yourself as the operator for a project or vertical. You sit between three groups that do not naturally talk to each other: the client who needs the data, the creative experts producing it, and the internal engineering team building the tooling. Your job is to make all three feel like they are working on the same thing, and to ship results that are both rigorous and genuinely useful.\n\n\n\nWhat you'll own\n\n - The methodology. Annotation protocols, rubrics, and evaluation designs for creative and multimodal outputs.\n\n - Delivery. Scope, evaluator staffing, quality routing, timelines, and the client relationship, from kickoff to final readout.\n\n - Quality. Data quality, inter-rater reliability, and real-time course correction when something feels off. You hold the bar, and you hold the levers to fix it.\n\n - Analysis and storytelling. Qualitative and quantitative analysis turned into clear findings, recommendations, reports, and workshops that clients act on.\n\n - The systems behind it. You turn repeated work into clean, measurable process, and you partner with engineering on the tooling that makes that process faster and more reliable.\n\n - The narrative. Case studies and benchmark publications that sharpen how Contra Labs is understood in the market.\n\n\n\nAbout you\n\n - You design studies for a living. You can scope a question, run the study, analyze the data, and translate it into a direction people can act on.\n\n - You understand good creative, and you can explain it. You recognize creative quality and can say why, and you can tell the difference between personal preference and something closer to ground truth. You build frameworks that capture that signal faithfully.\n\n - You care more about people than about technology for its own sake. You understand how humans judge creative work and design systems around that.\n\n - You turn messy work into machines. You make process clear, predictable, and measurable, and you run a tight ship across several projects at once.\n\n - High ownership, low ego, bias to action. You ship a v1, learn, and do what it takes to deliver.\n\n\n\nExperience\n\n - 3+ years designing studies, running evaluations, analyzing data, and presenting findings.\n\n - Experience with data labeling, annotation, human-in-the-loop systems, or AI and ML evaluation workflows.\n\n - A track record managing several concurrent projects, including annotation, evaluation, or QA work.\n\n - A real point of view on creative quality and what \"good\" looks like.\n\n\n\nBonus\n\n - A strong research background, qualitative and quantitative. A Master's or PhD in HCI, cognitive science, psychology, design research, or a related field is a plus, and so is equivalent depth from industry.\n\n - Statistical methods for evaluation work: inter-rater reliability, sampling, regression, significance testing.\n\n - RLHF, LLM evaluation, or benchmark design.\n\n - Ethnography, UX research, or design-study methods.\n\n - Startup or 0-to-1 experience.\n\n\n\nRequirements\n\n - Based in NYC. In office 5 days a week (Williamsburg).\n\n\n\nTotal comp\n\n - Salary: $150,000 to $200,000 USD plus equity\n\n - Medical, dental, vision\n\n - 401k matching\n\n - Company laptop on your start date\n\n\n\nInterview process\n\n 1. Recruiting team (20 minutes)\n\n 2. CEO and co-founder (30 minutes)\n\n 3. Technical interview, research and methods focus (45 minutes)\n\n 4. VP of Product (45 minutes)\n\n 5. Paid case study and presentation (60 minutes)\n\n\n\nNote: Contra communicates with applicants through contra.com http://contra.com domains only. We never ask candidates for money. For current postings, visit Contra Careers.","compensation":{"compensationTierSummary":"$150K – $200K • Offers Equity","scrapeableCompensationSalarySummary":"$150K - $200K","compensationTiers":[{"id":"b166333c-13ca-406b-bf58-0e53e6e979cf","tierSummary":"$150K – $200K • Offers Equity","title":null,"additionalInformation":null,"components":[{"id":"a533e900-00c0-42b6-9f4b-d7fcdd7822bc","summary":"$150K – $200K","compensationType":"Salary","interval":"1 YEAR","currencyCode":"USD","minValue":150000,"maxValue":200000},{"id":"ebed4c9f-7125-40bc-b6c1-224efe5e9f64","summary":"Offers Equity","compensationType":"EquityPercentage","interval":"NONE","currencyCode":null,"minValue":null,"maxValue":null}]}],"summaryComponents":[{"compensationType":"Salary","interval":"1 YEAR","currencyCode":"USD","minValue":150000,"maxValue":200000},{"compensationType":"EquityPercentage","interval":"NONE","currencyCode":null,"minValue":null,"maxValue":null}]}},{"id":"1318fb3a-d8c9-4fbf-9a2e-6fd30cb98531","title":"Strategic Project Lead","department":"Contra Labs","team":"Contra Labs","employmentType":"FullTime","location":"San Francisco","shouldDisplayCompensationOnJobPostings":true,"secondaryLocations":[],"publishedAt":"2026-07-01T15:54:44.146+00:00","isListed":true,"isRemote":true,"workplaceType":"Remote","address":{"postalAddress":{"addressRegion":"California ","addressCountry":"United States","addressLocality":"San Francisco"}},"jobUrl":"https://jobs.ashbyhq.com/contra/1318fb3a-d8c9-4fbf-9a2e-6fd30cb98531","applyUrl":"https://jobs.ashbyhq.com/contra/1318fb3a-d8c9-4fbf-9a2e-6fd30cb98531/application","descriptionHtml":"Who we are
Contra Labs is a human-centered research lab studying how creatives actually use AI, how tools can serve creative work better, and how to protect the originality that gets flattened as everything starts to look the same.
We connect a global network of top creative talent with frontier AI labs and product companies. By grounding our research in real creative workflows, we help define what \"good\" looks like across design, video, imagery, and beyond. Our work powers benchmarking, evaluation, and post-training for leading models and applications. Built on Contra, the professional network for independent creatives, we turn human judgment into the training and evaluation layer that helps these tools serve the people who use them.
Why this role exists
We are scaling across client engagements: post-training dataset creation, benchmarking programs, and ongoing evaluation partnerships. Each project spans a different mix of AI labs, creative-tool companies, and research teams, with different requirements, timelines, and quality bars. We need someone to own this work from end to end.
Think of yourself as the operator for a project or vertical. You sit between three groups that do not naturally talk to each other: the client who needs the data, the creative experts producing it, and the internal engineering team building the tooling. Your job is to make all three feel like they are working on the same thing, and to ship results that are both rigorous and genuinely useful.
What you'll own
The methodology. Annotation protocols, rubrics, and evaluation designs for creative and multimodal outputs.
Delivery. Scope, evaluator staffing, quality routing, timelines, and the client relationship, from kickoff to final readout.
Quality. Data quality, inter-rater reliability, and real-time course correction when something feels off. You hold the bar, and you hold the levers to fix it.
Analysis and storytelling. Qualitative and quantitative analysis turned into clear findings, recommendations, reports, and workshops that clients act on.
The systems behind it. You turn repeated work into clean, measurable process, and you partner with engineering on the tooling that makes that process faster and more reliable.
The narrative. Case studies and benchmark publications that sharpen how Contra Labs is understood in the market.
About you
You design studies for a living. You can scope a question, run the study, analyze the data, and translate it into a direction people can act on.
You understand good creative, and you can explain it. You recognize creative quality and can say why, and you can tell the difference between personal preference and something closer to ground truth. You build frameworks that capture that signal faithfully.
You care more about people than about technology for its own sake. You understand how humans judge creative work and design systems around that.
You turn messy work into machines. You make process clear, predictable, and measurable, and you run a tight ship across several projects at once.
High ownership, low ego, bias to action. You ship a v1, learn, and do what it takes to deliver.
Experience
3+ years designing studies, running evaluations, analyzing data, and presenting findings.
Experience with data labeling, annotation, human-in-the-loop systems, or AI and ML evaluation workflows.
A track record managing several concurrent projects, including annotation, evaluation, or QA work.
A real point of view on creative quality and what \"good\" looks like.
Bonus
A strong research background, qualitative and quantitative. A Master's or PhD in HCI, cognitive science, psychology, design research, or a related field is a plus, and so is equivalent depth from industry.
Statistical methods for evaluation work: inter-rater reliability, sampling, regression, significance testing.
RLHF, LLM evaluation, or benchmark design.
Ethnography, UX research, or design-study methods.
Startup or 0-to-1 experience.
Requirements
Based in San Francisco, California
Total comp
Salary: $150,000 to $200,000 USD plus equity
Medical, dental, vision
401k matching
Company laptop on your start date
Interview process
Recruiting team (20 minutes)
CEO and co-founder (30 minutes)
Technical interview, research and methods focus (45 minutes)
VP of Product (45 minutes)
Paid case study and presentation (60 minutes)
Note: Contra communicates with applicants through contra.com domains only. We never ask candidates for money. For current postings, visit Contra Careers.
","descriptionPlain":"Who we are\n\nContra Labs is a human-centered research lab studying how creatives actually use AI, how tools can serve creative work better, and how to protect the originality that gets flattened as everything starts to look the same.\n\nWe connect a global network of top creative talent with frontier AI labs and product companies. By grounding our research in real creative workflows, we help define what \"good\" looks like across design, video, imagery, and beyond. Our work powers benchmarking, evaluation, and post-training for leading models and applications. Built on Contra, the professional network for independent creatives, we turn human judgment into the training and evaluation layer that helps these tools serve the people who use them.\n\n\n\nWhy this role exists\n\nWe are scaling across client engagements: post-training dataset creation, benchmarking programs, and ongoing evaluation partnerships. Each project spans a different mix of AI labs, creative-tool companies, and research teams, with different requirements, timelines, and quality bars. We need someone to own this work from end to end.\n\nThink of yourself as the operator for a project or vertical. You sit between three groups that do not naturally talk to each other: the client who needs the data, the creative experts producing it, and the internal engineering team building the tooling. Your job is to make all three feel like they are working on the same thing, and to ship results that are both rigorous and genuinely useful.\n\n\n\nWhat you'll own\n\n - The methodology. Annotation protocols, rubrics, and evaluation designs for creative and multimodal outputs.\n\n - Delivery. Scope, evaluator staffing, quality routing, timelines, and the client relationship, from kickoff to final readout.\n\n - Quality. Data quality, inter-rater reliability, and real-time course correction when something feels off. You hold the bar, and you hold the levers to fix it.\n\n - Analysis and storytelling. Qualitative and quantitative analysis turned into clear findings, recommendations, reports, and workshops that clients act on.\n\n - The systems behind it. You turn repeated work into clean, measurable process, and you partner with engineering on the tooling that makes that process faster and more reliable.\n\n - The narrative. Case studies and benchmark publications that sharpen how Contra Labs is understood in the market.\n\n\n\nAbout you\n\n - You design studies for a living. You can scope a question, run the study, analyze the data, and translate it into a direction people can act on.\n\n - You understand good creative, and you can explain it. You recognize creative quality and can say why, and you can tell the difference between personal preference and something closer to ground truth. You build frameworks that capture that signal faithfully.\n\n - You care more about people than about technology for its own sake. You understand how humans judge creative work and design systems around that.\n\n - You turn messy work into machines. You make process clear, predictable, and measurable, and you run a tight ship across several projects at once.\n\n - High ownership, low ego, bias to action. You ship a v1, learn, and do what it takes to deliver.\n\n\n\nExperience\n\n - 3+ years designing studies, running evaluations, analyzing data, and presenting findings.\n\n - Experience with data labeling, annotation, human-in-the-loop systems, or AI and ML evaluation workflows.\n\n - A track record managing several concurrent projects, including annotation, evaluation, or QA work.\n\n - A real point of view on creative quality and what \"good\" looks like.\n\n\n\nBonus\n\n - A strong research background, qualitative and quantitative. A Master's or PhD in HCI, cognitive science, psychology, design research, or a related field is a plus, and so is equivalent depth from industry.\n\n - Statistical methods for evaluation work: inter-rater reliability, sampling, regression, significance testing.\n\n - RLHF, LLM evaluation, or benchmark design.\n\n - Ethnography, UX research, or design-study methods.\n\n - Startup or 0-to-1 experience.\n\n\n\nRequirements\n\n - Based in San Francisco, California\n\n\n\nTotal comp\n\n - Salary: $150,000 to $200,000 USD plus equity\n\n - Medical, dental, vision\n\n - 401k matching\n\n - Company laptop on your start date\n\n\n\nInterview process\n\n 1. Recruiting team (20 minutes)\n\n 2. CEO and co-founder (30 minutes)\n\n 3. Technical interview, research and methods focus (45 minutes)\n\n 4. VP of Product (45 minutes)\n\n 5. Paid case study and presentation (60 minutes)\n\n\n\nNote: Contra communicates with applicants through contra.com http://contra.com domains only. We never ask candidates for money. For current postings, visit Contra Careers.","compensation":{"compensationTierSummary":"$150K – $200K • Offers Equity","scrapeableCompensationSalarySummary":"$150K - $200K","compensationTiers":[{"id":"fad1ee97-fde7-40cb-93fe-181c9e7019b1","tierSummary":"$150K – $200K • Offers Equity","title":null,"additionalInformation":null,"components":[{"id":"b4660a70-6a2b-4cf2-b1f5-3a2683f8f897","summary":"$150K – $200K","compensationType":"Salary","interval":"1 YEAR","currencyCode":"USD","minValue":150000,"maxValue":200000},{"id":"dfa23ddb-c315-4814-be39-de1d36d5fb91","summary":"Offers Equity","compensationType":"EquityPercentage","interval":"NONE","currencyCode":null,"minValue":null,"maxValue":null}]}],"summaryComponents":[{"compensationType":"Salary","interval":"1 YEAR","currencyCode":"USD","minValue":150000,"maxValue":200000},{"compensationType":"EquityPercentage","interval":"NONE","currencyCode":null,"minValue":null,"maxValue":null}]}},{"id":"55b378db-0732-40c0-8a68-a11569978080","title":"Special Project Lead","department":"Contra Labs","team":"Contra Labs","employmentType":"FullTime","location":"New York City (Onsite)","shouldDisplayCompensationOnJobPostings":true,"secondaryLocations":[],"publishedAt":"2026-07-30T15:02:02.330+00:00","isListed":true,"isRemote":false,"workplaceType":"OnSite","address":{"postalAddress":{"addressRegion":"New York","addressCountry":"United States","addressLocality":"New York City"}},"jobUrl":"https://jobs.ashbyhq.com/contra/55b378db-0732-40c0-8a68-a11569978080","applyUrl":"https://jobs.ashbyhq.com/contra/55b378db-0732-40c0-8a68-a11569978080/application","descriptionHtml":"Who we are
Contra Labs is a human-centered research lab studying how creatives actually use AI, how tools can serve creative work better, and how to protect the originality that gets flattened as everything starts to look the same.
We connect a global network of top creative talent with frontier AI labs and product companies. By grounding our research in real creative workflows, we help define what \"good\" looks like across design, video, imagery, and beyond. Our work powers benchmarking, evaluation, and post-training for leading models and applications. Built on Contra, the professional network for independent creatives, we turn human judgment into the training and evaluation layer that helps these tools serve the people who use them.
Why this role exists
We are scaling across client engagements: post-training dataset creation, benchmarking programs, and ongoing evaluation partnerships. Each project spans a different mix of AI labs, creative-tool companies, and research teams, with different requirements, timelines, and quality bars. We need someone to own this work from end to end.
Think of yourself as the operator for a project or vertical. You sit between three groups that do not naturally talk to each other: the client who needs the data, the creative experts producing it, and the internal engineering team building the tooling. Your job is to make all three feel like they are working on the same thing, and to ship results that are both rigorous and genuinely useful.
What you'll own
The methodology. Annotation protocols, rubrics, and evaluation designs for creative and multimodal outputs.
Delivery. Scope, evaluator staffing, quality routing, timelines, and the client relationship, from kickoff to final readout.
Quality. Data quality, inter-rater reliability, and real-time course correction when something feels off. You hold the bar, and you hold the levers to fix it.
Analysis and storytelling. Qualitative and quantitative analysis turned into clear findings, recommendations, reports, and workshops that clients act on.
The systems behind it. You turn repeated work into clean, measurable process, and you partner with engineering on the tooling that makes that process faster and more reliable.
The narrative. Case studies and benchmark publications that sharpen how Contra Labs is understood in the market.
About you
You design studies for a living. You can scope a question, run the study, analyze the data, and translate it into a direction people can act on.
You understand good creative, and you can explain it. You recognize creative quality and can say why, and you can tell the difference between personal preference and something closer to ground truth. You build frameworks that capture that signal faithfully.
You care more about people than about technology for its own sake. You understand how humans judge creative work and design systems around that.
You turn messy work into machines. You make process clear, predictable, and measurable, and you run a tight ship across several projects at once.
High ownership, low ego, bias to action. You ship a v1, learn, and do what it takes to deliver.
Experience
3+ years designing studies, running evaluations, analyzing data, and presenting findings.
Experience with data labeling, annotation, human-in-the-loop systems, or AI and ML evaluation workflows.
A track record managing several concurrent projects, including annotation, evaluation, or QA work.
A real point of view on creative quality and what \"good\" looks like.
Bonus
A strong research background, qualitative and quantitative. A Master's or PhD in HCI, cognitive science, psychology, design research, or a related field is a plus, and so is equivalent depth from industry.
Statistical methods for evaluation work: inter-rater reliability, sampling, regression, significance testing.
RLHF, LLM evaluation, or benchmark design.
Ethnography, UX research, or design-study methods.
Startup or 0-to-1 experience.
Requirements
Based in NYC. In office 5 days a week (Williamsburg).
Total comp
Salary: $150,000 to $200,000 USD plus equity
Medical, dental, vision
401k matching
Company laptop on your start date
Interview process
Recruiting team (20 minutes)
CEO and co-founder (30 minutes)
Technical interview, research and methods focus (45 minutes)
VP of Product (45 minutes)
Paid case study and presentation (60 minutes)
Note: Contra communicates with applicants through contra.com domains only. We never ask candidates for money. For current postings, visit Contra Careers.
","descriptionPlain":"Who we are\n\nContra Labs is a human-centered research lab studying how creatives actually use AI, how tools can serve creative work better, and how to protect the originality that gets flattened as everything starts to look the same.\n\nWe connect a global network of top creative talent with frontier AI labs and product companies. By grounding our research in real creative workflows, we help define what \"good\" looks like across design, video, imagery, and beyond. Our work powers benchmarking, evaluation, and post-training for leading models and applications. Built on Contra, the professional network for independent creatives, we turn human judgment into the training and evaluation layer that helps these tools serve the people who use them.\n\n\n\nWhy this role exists\n\nWe are scaling across client engagements: post-training dataset creation, benchmarking programs, and ongoing evaluation partnerships. Each project spans a different mix of AI labs, creative-tool companies, and research teams, with different requirements, timelines, and quality bars. We need someone to own this work from end to end.\n\nThink of yourself as the operator for a project or vertical. You sit between three groups that do not naturally talk to each other: the client who needs the data, the creative experts producing it, and the internal engineering team building the tooling. Your job is to make all three feel like they are working on the same thing, and to ship results that are both rigorous and genuinely useful.\n\n\n\nWhat you'll own\n\n - The methodology. Annotation protocols, rubrics, and evaluation designs for creative and multimodal outputs.\n\n - Delivery. Scope, evaluator staffing, quality routing, timelines, and the client relationship, from kickoff to final readout.\n\n - Quality. Data quality, inter-rater reliability, and real-time course correction when something feels off. You hold the bar, and you hold the levers to fix it.\n\n - Analysis and storytelling. Qualitative and quantitative analysis turned into clear findings, recommendations, reports, and workshops that clients act on.\n\n - The systems behind it. You turn repeated work into clean, measurable process, and you partner with engineering on the tooling that makes that process faster and more reliable.\n\n - The narrative. Case studies and benchmark publications that sharpen how Contra Labs is understood in the market.\n\n\n\nAbout you\n\n - You design studies for a living. You can scope a question, run the study, analyze the data, and translate it into a direction people can act on.\n\n - You understand good creative, and you can explain it. You recognize creative quality and can say why, and you can tell the difference between personal preference and something closer to ground truth. You build frameworks that capture that signal faithfully.\n\n - You care more about people than about technology for its own sake. You understand how humans judge creative work and design systems around that.\n\n - You turn messy work into machines. You make process clear, predictable, and measurable, and you run a tight ship across several projects at once.\n\n - High ownership, low ego, bias to action. You ship a v1, learn, and do what it takes to deliver.\n\n\n\nExperience\n\n - 3+ years designing studies, running evaluations, analyzing data, and presenting findings.\n\n - Experience with data labeling, annotation, human-in-the-loop systems, or AI and ML evaluation workflows.\n\n - A track record managing several concurrent projects, including annotation, evaluation, or QA work.\n\n - A real point of view on creative quality and what \"good\" looks like.\n\n\n\nBonus\n\n - A strong research background, qualitative and quantitative. A Master's or PhD in HCI, cognitive science, psychology, design research, or a related field is a plus, and so is equivalent depth from industry.\n\n - Statistical methods for evaluation work: inter-rater reliability, sampling, regression, significance testing.\n\n - RLHF, LLM evaluation, or benchmark design.\n\n - Ethnography, UX research, or design-study methods.\n\n - Startup or 0-to-1 experience.\n\n\n\nRequirements\n\n - Based in NYC. In office 5 days a week (Williamsburg).\n\n\n\nTotal comp\n\n - Salary: $150,000 to $200,000 USD plus equity\n\n - Medical, dental, vision\n\n - 401k matching\n\n - Company laptop on your start date\n\n\n\nInterview process\n\n 1. Recruiting team (20 minutes)\n\n 2. CEO and co-founder (30 minutes)\n\n 3. Technical interview, research and methods focus (45 minutes)\n\n 4. VP of Product (45 minutes)\n\n 5. Paid case study and presentation (60 minutes)\n\n\n\nNote: Contra communicates with applicants through contra.com http://contra.com domains only. We never ask candidates for money. For current postings, visit Contra Careers.","compensation":{"compensationTierSummary":"$150K – $200K • Offers Equity","scrapeableCompensationSalarySummary":"$150K - $200K","compensationTiers":[{"id":"92dd290a-0f3e-41f7-ab51-e19003223524","tierSummary":"$150K – $200K • Offers Equity","title":null,"additionalInformation":null,"components":[{"id":"ad7180c2-66d7-4d86-aaf0-043d9b006dde","summary":"$150K – $200K","compensationType":"Salary","interval":"1 YEAR","currencyCode":"USD","minValue":150000,"maxValue":200000},{"id":"3a74a8aa-b399-4fe8-9b18-8c6a564478f7","summary":"Offers Equity","compensationType":"EquityPercentage","interval":"NONE","currencyCode":null,"minValue":null,"maxValue":null}]}],"summaryComponents":[{"compensationType":"Salary","interval":"1 YEAR","currencyCode":"USD","minValue":150000,"maxValue":200000},{"compensationType":"EquityPercentage","interval":"NONE","currencyCode":null,"minValue":null,"maxValue":null}]}},{"id":"477b02a0-9b49-4f3a-8a01-3ae85f649701","title":"Research Scientist, Human Data & Evaluation","department":"Contra Labs","team":"Contra Labs","employmentType":"FullTime","location":"New York City (Onsite)","shouldDisplayCompensationOnJobPostings":false,"secondaryLocations":[],"publishedAt":"2026-08-17T15:48:54.372+00:00","isListed":true,"isRemote":false,"workplaceType":"OnSite","address":{"postalAddress":{"addressRegion":"New York","addressCountry":"United States","addressLocality":"New York City"}},"jobUrl":"https://jobs.ashbyhq.com/contra/477b02a0-9b49-4f3a-8a01-3ae85f649701","applyUrl":"https://jobs.ashbyhq.com/contra/477b02a0-9b49-4f3a-8a01-3ae85f649701/application","descriptionHtml":"Who we are and what we do
Contra Labs is a human-centered AI lab focused on creative and multimodal outputs, where human taste defines the next generation of AI capabilities.
We build industry-leading creative preference datasets that power benchmarking, evaluation, and post-training for the world's leading AI models and applications. Our work helps define what \"good\" looks like across design, video, imagery, and beyond.
Built on top of Contra, the professional network for independent creatives, Contra Labs connects frontier AI labs with a global network of top creative talent. Together, we turn human judgment into the training and evaluation layer that enables AI models and tools to power the next generation of human creativity.
Why this role exists
Contra Labs is expanding its research work with frontier AI labs across evaluation, post-training data, benchmarking, and human-centered research.
We need a researcher who can take an ambiguous client or research question and independently turn it into a rigorous project: identify the right research direction, develop the methodology, write the proposal, run the work, analyze the results, and produce insights that shape what we or the client should do next.
This person should complement our existing project execution capacity by bringing deeper research ownership and the ability to generate net-new ideas and approaches.
What you'll own
Research direction & proposals
Translate ambiguous client questions into clear research questions, hypotheses, and study designs.
Develop research proposals and methodologies from scratch rather than relying on a predefined approach.
Identify promising new research directions and push the team toward ideas we have not already considered.
Help define what Contra Labs should measure, study, and build next.
Evaluation & data methodology
Design human-data collection strategies, evaluation protocols, rubrics, annotation schemes, and experiments.
Develop strong prompt strategies for eliciting, evaluating, and comparing model behavior.
Determine appropriate sampling, evaluator selection, calibration, quality-control, and reliability methods.
Design methodologies that work across creative and multimodal domains such as design, image, video, and agentic workflows.
Analysis & insight generation
Analyze qualitative and quantitative evaluation data.
Move beyond reporting results to explain why patterns occur and what they imply.
Synthesize findings into clear recommendations, research narratives, and new hypotheses.
Produce client-ready reports, presentations, benchmarks, and research publications.
End-to-end project ownership
Independently own research engagements from initial scoping through final delivery.
Work closely with project leads, creative experts, research engineers, and data/engineering teams.
Maintain a high bar for research rigor and data quality while operating on fast client timelines.
Potentially support multiple concurrent projects at different stages.
Client work
Be comfortable working on research driven by real client problems and constraints.
Participate in scoping and proposal development and help establish credibility with sophisticated AI/ML research teams.
Direct client-facing experience is valuable, but this is not primarily an account-management role. You will collaborate with Strategic Project Leads on client delivery.
What we're looking for
3–5+ years of relevant research experience, with a Master’s, PhD, or equivalent industry research depth in HCI, Human-Centered AI, ML, design research, or a related field.
Strong qualitative and quantitative research skills, with experience in human evaluation, experimentation, data collection, UX/HCI, annotation, or model behavior research.
Proven ability to independently design and execute rigorous research, including deciding what data to collect, why, and how to analyze it.
Ability to turn data and observations into new insights, research directions, and actionable recommendations.
Comfortable analyzing data with Python and/or SQL.
Strong written communication and ability to clearly explain methodological tradeoffs and research decisions.
Comfortable operating independently through ambiguity and balancing research rigor with startup speed and pragmatism.
Bonus
Familiarity with modern ML and generative AI systems.
Understanding of RLHF / post-training / preference data / model evaluation.
Experience studying image, video, multimodal, creative, or agentic systems.
Experience designing prompts or systematically studying prompting/model behavior.
Experience working with large-scale human-data or annotation programs.
Experience working directly with AI research or model teams.
Strong publication record or other evidence of consistently generating original research ideas.
Startup / 0-to-1 experience.
Requirements
Based in NYC, USA
In-office 5 days/week (Williamsburg)
Total Comp
Salary: $150,000 - $200,000 USD + Equity
Medical, Dental, Vision Benefits
401k Matching
We will provide you with a company laptop on your start date
Interview Process
Interview with Recruiting Team (20 minutes)
Interview with Head of Research (30 minutes)
Technical interview with Data Lead (30 minutes)
Interview with Head of Contra Labs (30 minutes)
Paid Case Study and Presentation (60 minutes)
Note: Contra communicates with applicants through @contra.com domains only. We never ask for money from potential employees. For the latest job postings, visit Contra Careers.
","descriptionPlain":"Who we are and what we do\n\nContra Labs is a human-centered AI lab focused on creative and multimodal outputs, where human taste defines the next generation of AI capabilities.\n\nWe build industry-leading creative preference datasets that power benchmarking, evaluation, and post-training for the world's leading AI models and applications. Our work helps define what \"good\" looks like across design, video, imagery, and beyond.\n\nBuilt on top of Contra, the professional network for independent creatives, Contra Labs connects frontier AI labs with a global network of top creative talent. Together, we turn human judgment into the training and evaluation layer that enables AI models and tools to power the next generation of human creativity.\n\nWhy this role exists\n\nContra Labs is expanding its research work with frontier AI labs across evaluation, post-training data, benchmarking, and human-centered research.\n\nWe need a researcher who can take an ambiguous client or research question and independently turn it into a rigorous project: identify the right research direction, develop the methodology, write the proposal, run the work, analyze the results, and produce insights that shape what we or the client should do next.\n\nThis person should complement our existing project execution capacity by bringing deeper research ownership and the ability to generate net-new ideas and approaches.\n\nWhat you'll own\n\n - Research direction & proposals\n \n - Translate ambiguous client questions into clear research questions, hypotheses, and study designs.\n \n - Develop research proposals and methodologies from scratch rather than relying on a predefined approach.\n \n - Identify promising new research directions and push the team toward ideas we have not already considered.\n \n - Help define what Contra Labs should measure, study, and build next.\n\n - Evaluation & data methodology\n \n - Design human-data collection strategies, evaluation protocols, rubrics, annotation schemes, and experiments.\n \n - Develop strong prompt strategies for eliciting, evaluating, and comparing model behavior.\n \n - Determine appropriate sampling, evaluator selection, calibration, quality-control, and reliability methods.\n \n - Design methodologies that work across creative and multimodal domains such as design, image, video, and agentic workflows.\n\n - Analysis & insight generation\n \n - Analyze qualitative and quantitative evaluation data.\n \n - Move beyond reporting results to explain why patterns occur and what they imply.\n \n - Synthesize findings into clear recommendations, research narratives, and new hypotheses.\n \n - Produce client-ready reports, presentations, benchmarks, and research publications.\n\n - End-to-end project ownership\n \n - Independently own research engagements from initial scoping through final delivery.\n \n - Work closely with project leads, creative experts, research engineers, and data/engineering teams.\n \n - Maintain a high bar for research rigor and data quality while operating on fast client timelines.\n \n - Potentially support multiple concurrent projects at different stages.\n\n - Client work\n \n - Be comfortable working on research driven by real client problems and constraints.\n \n - Participate in scoping and proposal development and help establish credibility with sophisticated AI/ML research teams.\n \n - Direct client-facing experience is valuable, but this is not primarily an account-management role. You will collaborate with Strategic Project Leads on client delivery.\n\nWhat we're looking for\n\n - 3–5+ years of relevant research experience, with a Master’s, PhD, or equivalent industry research depth in HCI, Human-Centered AI, ML, design research, or a related field.\n\n - Strong qualitative and quantitative research skills, with experience in human evaluation, experimentation, data collection, UX/HCI, annotation, or model behavior research.\n\n - Proven ability to independently design and execute rigorous research, including deciding what data to collect, why, and how to analyze it.\n\n - Ability to turn data and observations into new insights, research directions, and actionable recommendations.\n\n - Comfortable analyzing data with Python and/or SQL.\n\n - Strong written communication and ability to clearly explain methodological tradeoffs and research decisions.\n\n - Comfortable operating independently through ambiguity and balancing research rigor with startup speed and pragmatism.\n\nBonus\n\n - Familiarity with modern ML and generative AI systems.\n\n - Understanding of RLHF / post-training / preference data / model evaluation.\n\n - Experience studying image, video, multimodal, creative, or agentic systems.\n\n - Experience designing prompts or systematically studying prompting/model behavior.\n\n - Experience working with large-scale human-data or annotation programs.\n\n - Experience working directly with AI research or model teams.\n\n - Strong publication record or other evidence of consistently generating original research ideas.\n\n - Startup / 0-to-1 experience.\n\nRequirements\n\n - Based in NYC, USA\n\n - In-office 5 days/week (Williamsburg)\n\nTotal Comp\n\n - Salary: $150,000 - $200,000 USD + Equity\n\n - Medical, Dental, Vision Benefits\n\n - 401k Matching\n\n - We will provide you with a company laptop on your start date\n\nInterview Process\n\n 1. Interview with Recruiting Team (20 minutes)\n\n 2. Interview with Head of Research (30 minutes)\n\n 3. Technical interview with Data Lead (30 minutes)\n\n 4. Interview with Head of Contra Labs (30 minutes)\n\n 5. Paid Case Study and Presentation (60 minutes)\n\nNote: Contra communicates with applicants through @contra.com http://contra.com domains only. We never ask for money from potential employees. For the latest job postings, visit Contra Careers https://www.contra.com/careers.","compensation":{"compensationTierSummary":null,"scrapeableCompensationSalarySummary":null,"compensationTiers":[],"summaryComponents":[]}},{"id":"e16cd3ca-082f-4608-abe7-8dc86b595fc7","title":"Research Scientist, Human Data & Evaluation","department":"Contra Labs","team":"Contra Labs","employmentType":"FullTime","location":"San Francisco","shouldDisplayCompensationOnJobPostings":false,"secondaryLocations":[],"publishedAt":"2026-08-17T15:49:20.067+00:00","isListed":true,"isRemote":true,"workplaceType":"Remote","address":{"postalAddress":{"addressRegion":"California ","addressCountry":"United States","addressLocality":"San Francisco"}},"jobUrl":"https://jobs.ashbyhq.com/contra/e16cd3ca-082f-4608-abe7-8dc86b595fc7","applyUrl":"https://jobs.ashbyhq.com/contra/e16cd3ca-082f-4608-abe7-8dc86b595fc7/application","descriptionHtml":"Who we are and what we do
Contra Labs is a human-centered AI lab focused on creative and multimodal outputs, where human taste defines the next generation of AI capabilities.
We build industry-leading creative preference datasets that power benchmarking, evaluation, and post-training for the world's leading AI models and applications. Our work helps define what \"good\" looks like across design, video, imagery, and beyond.
Built on top of Contra, the professional network for independent creatives, Contra Labs connects frontier AI labs with a global network of top creative talent. Together, we turn human judgment into the training and evaluation layer that enables AI models and tools to power the next generation of human creativity.
Why this role exists
Contra Labs is expanding its research work with frontier AI labs across evaluation, post-training data, benchmarking, and human-centered research.
We need a researcher who can take an ambiguous client or research question and independently turn it into a rigorous project: identify the right research direction, develop the methodology, write the proposal, run the work, analyze the results, and produce insights that shape what we or the client should do next.
This person should complement our existing project execution capacity by bringing deeper research ownership and the ability to generate net-new ideas and approaches.
What you'll own
Research direction & proposals
Translate ambiguous client questions into clear research questions, hypotheses, and study designs.
Develop research proposals and methodologies from scratch rather than relying on a predefined approach.
Identify promising new research directions and push the team toward ideas we have not already considered.
Help define what Contra Labs should measure, study, and build next.
Evaluation & data methodology
Design human-data collection strategies, evaluation protocols, rubrics, annotation schemes, and experiments.
Develop strong prompt strategies for eliciting, evaluating, and comparing model behavior.
Determine appropriate sampling, evaluator selection, calibration, quality-control, and reliability methods.
Design methodologies that work across creative and multimodal domains such as design, image, video, and agentic workflows.
Analysis & insight generation
Analyze qualitative and quantitative evaluation data.
Move beyond reporting results to explain why patterns occur and what they imply.
Synthesize findings into clear recommendations, research narratives, and new hypotheses.
Produce client-ready reports, presentations, benchmarks, and research publications.
End-to-end project ownership
Independently own research engagements from initial scoping through final delivery.
Work closely with project leads, creative experts, research engineers, and data/engineering teams.
Maintain a high bar for research rigor and data quality while operating on fast client timelines.
Potentially support multiple concurrent projects at different stages.
Client work
Be comfortable working on research driven by real client problems and constraints.
Participate in scoping and proposal development and help establish credibility with sophisticated AI/ML research teams.
Direct client-facing experience is valuable, but this is not primarily an account-management role. You will collaborate with Strategic Project Leads on client delivery.
What we're looking for
3–5+ years of relevant research experience, with a Master’s, PhD, or equivalent industry research depth in HCI, Human-Centered AI, ML, design research, or a related field.
Strong qualitative and quantitative research skills, with experience in human evaluation, experimentation, data collection, UX/HCI, annotation, or model behavior research.
Proven ability to independently design and execute rigorous research, including deciding what data to collect, why, and how to analyze it.
Ability to turn data and observations into new insights, research directions, and actionable recommendations.
Comfortable analyzing data with Python and/or SQL.
Strong written communication and ability to clearly explain methodological tradeoffs and research decisions.
Comfortable operating independently through ambiguity and balancing research rigor with startup speed and pragmatism.
Bonus
Familiarity with modern ML and generative AI systems.
Understanding of RLHF / post-training / preference data / model evaluation.
Experience studying image, video, multimodal, creative, or agentic systems.
Experience designing prompts or systematically studying prompting/model behavior.
Experience working with large-scale human-data or annotation programs.
Experience working directly with AI research or model teams.
Strong publication record or other evidence of consistently generating original research ideas.
Startup / 0-to-1 experience.
Requirements
Based in San Francisco, California
Total Comp
Salary: $150,000 - $200,000 USD + Equity
Medical, Dental, Vision Benefits
401k Matching
We will provide you with a company laptop on your start date
Interview Process
Interview with Recruiting Team (20 minutes)
Interview with Head of Research (30 minutes)
Technical interview with Data Lead (30 minutes)
Interview with Head of Contra Labs (30 minutes)
Paid Case Study and Presentation (60 minutes)
Note: Contra communicates with applicants through @contra.com domains only. We never ask for money from potential employees. For the latest job postings, visit Contra Careers.
","descriptionPlain":"Who we are and what we do\n\nContra Labs is a human-centered AI lab focused on creative and multimodal outputs, where human taste defines the next generation of AI capabilities.\n\nWe build industry-leading creative preference datasets that power benchmarking, evaluation, and post-training for the world's leading AI models and applications. Our work helps define what \"good\" looks like across design, video, imagery, and beyond.\n\nBuilt on top of Contra, the professional network for independent creatives, Contra Labs connects frontier AI labs with a global network of top creative talent. Together, we turn human judgment into the training and evaluation layer that enables AI models and tools to power the next generation of human creativity.\n\nWhy this role exists\n\nContra Labs is expanding its research work with frontier AI labs across evaluation, post-training data, benchmarking, and human-centered research.\n\nWe need a researcher who can take an ambiguous client or research question and independently turn it into a rigorous project: identify the right research direction, develop the methodology, write the proposal, run the work, analyze the results, and produce insights that shape what we or the client should do next.\n\nThis person should complement our existing project execution capacity by bringing deeper research ownership and the ability to generate net-new ideas and approaches.\n\nWhat you'll own\n\n - Research direction & proposals\n \n - Translate ambiguous client questions into clear research questions, hypotheses, and study designs.\n \n - Develop research proposals and methodologies from scratch rather than relying on a predefined approach.\n \n - Identify promising new research directions and push the team toward ideas we have not already considered.\n \n - Help define what Contra Labs should measure, study, and build next.\n\n - Evaluation & data methodology\n \n - Design human-data collection strategies, evaluation protocols, rubrics, annotation schemes, and experiments.\n \n - Develop strong prompt strategies for eliciting, evaluating, and comparing model behavior.\n \n - Determine appropriate sampling, evaluator selection, calibration, quality-control, and reliability methods.\n \n - Design methodologies that work across creative and multimodal domains such as design, image, video, and agentic workflows.\n\n - Analysis & insight generation\n \n - Analyze qualitative and quantitative evaluation data.\n \n - Move beyond reporting results to explain why patterns occur and what they imply.\n \n - Synthesize findings into clear recommendations, research narratives, and new hypotheses.\n \n - Produce client-ready reports, presentations, benchmarks, and research publications.\n\n - End-to-end project ownership\n \n - Independently own research engagements from initial scoping through final delivery.\n \n - Work closely with project leads, creative experts, research engineers, and data/engineering teams.\n \n - Maintain a high bar for research rigor and data quality while operating on fast client timelines.\n \n - Potentially support multiple concurrent projects at different stages.\n\n - Client work\n \n - Be comfortable working on research driven by real client problems and constraints.\n \n - Participate in scoping and proposal development and help establish credibility with sophisticated AI/ML research teams.\n \n - Direct client-facing experience is valuable, but this is not primarily an account-management role. You will collaborate with Strategic Project Leads on client delivery.\n\nWhat we're looking for\n\n - 3–5+ years of relevant research experience, with a Master’s, PhD, or equivalent industry research depth in HCI, Human-Centered AI, ML, design research, or a related field.\n\n - Strong qualitative and quantitative research skills, with experience in human evaluation, experimentation, data collection, UX/HCI, annotation, or model behavior research.\n\n - Proven ability to independently design and execute rigorous research, including deciding what data to collect, why, and how to analyze it.\n\n - Ability to turn data and observations into new insights, research directions, and actionable recommendations.\n\n - Comfortable analyzing data with Python and/or SQL.\n\n - Strong written communication and ability to clearly explain methodological tradeoffs and research decisions.\n\n - Comfortable operating independently through ambiguity and balancing research rigor with startup speed and pragmatism.\n\nBonus\n\n - Familiarity with modern ML and generative AI systems.\n\n - Understanding of RLHF / post-training / preference data / model evaluation.\n\n - Experience studying image, video, multimodal, creative, or agentic systems.\n\n - Experience designing prompts or systematically studying prompting/model behavior.\n\n - Experience working with large-scale human-data or annotation programs.\n\n - Experience working directly with AI research or model teams.\n\n - Strong publication record or other evidence of consistently generating original research ideas.\n\n - Startup / 0-to-1 experience.\n\nRequirements\n\n - Based in San Francisco, California\n\nTotal Comp\n\n - Salary: $150,000 - $200,000 USD + Equity\n\n - Medical, Dental, Vision Benefits\n\n - 401k Matching\n\n - We will provide you with a company laptop on your start date\n\nInterview Process\n\n 1. Interview with Recruiting Team (20 minutes)\n\n 2. Interview with Head of Research (30 minutes)\n\n 3. Technical interview with Data Lead (30 minutes)\n\n 4. Interview with Head of Contra Labs (30 minutes)\n\n 5. Paid Case Study and Presentation (60 minutes)\n\nNote: Contra communicates with applicants through @contra.com http://contra.com domains only. We never ask for money from potential employees. For the latest job postings, visit Contra Careers https://www.contra.com/careers.","compensation":{"compensationTierSummary":null,"scrapeableCompensationSalarySummary":null,"compensationTiers":[],"summaryComponents":[]}}],"apiVersion":"1"}