United States onlyInstrument is a digitally native design and technology company built to help brands unlock their full potential. Since 2005, our 300+ team of makers, thinkers, and storytellers has partnered with leading brands like Google, Nike, Uber, ŌURA, and Eventbrite to craft digital experiences that create impact and drive results.
Unlike traditional agencies, we don’t just design—we build. Our work lives at the intersection of taste and technology, powered by curiosity, thoughtful curation, and a commitment to delivering the most fitting solution for every brief. We bring this to life across three core offerings: Brand, Marketing, and Product.
As a member of our freelance network, you’ll collaborate with our teams to bring bold ideas to life—whether launching new brands, building digital products, or shaping experiences that move people. We welcome collaborators from all backgrounds and experiences who share our curiosity, creativity, and care for craft.
We believe great work comes from diverse perspectives and shared purpose. If you’re passionate about learning, experimenting, and making work that matters, we’d love to hear from you.
Contract Dates: 1/5/2026–3/13/2026
Hours: 40 hrs/week
Instrument will design, develop, and launch a hybrid mobile application for a major 2026 event, leveraging EventBase as the core platform foundation with custom-built features for enhanced attendee experience. This includes platform management, brand reskinning, custom development for Link integration and pre-event onboarding, platform integration coordination, QA, app store submission support, and live event week support.
We are seeking a Front-End Technical Lead to guide the architecture, component development, and engineering workflows that bring this product to life. You will lead the front-end development effort across a highly collaborative, multi-disciplinary team—ensuring the technical vision is clear, the component system is scalable, and delivery is predictable. You bring deep expertise in modern React/Next.js architectures, accessibility, and performance, paired with strong cross-disciplinary communication skills. You operate with clarity and calm, proactively removing blockers, defining implementation patterns, partnering with producers to maintain development velocity, and elevating the overall quality of execution across the team.
What You'll Do
- Define and communicate front-end architecture for a hybrid mobile app built on EventBase with custom React/Next.js-driven experiences.
- Establish scalable patterns for component architecture, data flows, state management, and integration with REST/GraphQL APIs.
- Ensure performance best practices, Web Vitals optimization, asset strategy, and efficient bundling/code splitting.
- Translate Figma designs into accessible, maintainable component libraries using modern React patterns, design tokens, Storybook, and modular architecture.
- Partner with Design to refine interaction patterns, micro-animations, responsive behavior, and UI scalability.
- Ensure accessibility meets WCAG AA standards (semantic structure, keyboard navigation, screen reader support).
- Own front-end code quality and consistency through reviews, linters, type safety, and CI/CD collaboration.
- Guide engineers in debugging complex issues across hybrid mobile and browser contexts.
- Partner with Technical Producers to clarify requirements, contribute to work breakdown, refine tickets, estimate effort, and surface risks early—mirroring Instrument’s expectations for proactive, solution-oriented leadership.
- Align closely with EventBase engineers to ensure seamless platform integration.
- Support QA and implementation during app store submission and live event operations.
- Set standards for readability, maintainability, craftsmanship, and documentation.
- Provide hands-on support and mentorship to front-end contributors, helping level up execution and consistency.
What You'll Bring
- Expert-level React.js experience including hooks, context, component composition, state management, and performance tuning.
- Advanced Next.js experience with SSR, SSG, ISR, routing, server actions, middleware, and edge rendering.
- Strong TypeScript proficiency for predictable and scalable codebases.
- Experience with Tailwind, Styled Components, or similar modern styling systems.
- Deep familiarity with state management (Zustand or similar) and API integration patterns.
- Working knowledge of the Node.js ecosystem for tooling and light backend collaboration.
- Proven ability to lead engineering efforts on complex, multi-disciplinary digital products—demonstrating clarity, calm, and proactive communication.
- Ability to “translate” between design, product, engineering, and client/partner needs to ensure shared understanding and aligned expectations.
- Experience collaborating within Agile workflows and CI/CD pipelines.
- Strong sense of ownership for delivery quality, technical feasibility, and continuous improvement.
Pay Range
- The expected pay range for this role is $84-$103 per hour (on a 1099), but will depend on the level in which you are engaged
- Our company has three regional pay bands that it adheres to depending on your location, we reference them as US 1, US 2, and US 3.
- US 3 is our base pay. Examples of cities in US 3 are Portland, Houston and Miami.
- US 2 pay is 7.5% higher than US 3 to meet the market rates. Examples of cities in US 2 are Los Angeles, Chicago and Seattle.
- US 1 pay is 15% higher than US 3 to meet market rates. Examples of cities in US 1 are Brooklyn and San Francisco.
- If you are curious which region you are in, please apply and get connected with our recruiting team!
