Artificial Intelligence Engineer

Brunel; Toronto; Remote; CAD 140,000 - 180,000; Full time

Job summary

Brunel is seeking an Agentic AI Engineer for a remote (EST hours in Canada) contract. You will build and host LLM-based agents for an HR/payroll automation project, extending MCP, deploying on Azure, and integrating with Microsoft 365 tools.

You will ship production code, measure outcomes, and bring new AI ideas to the table. You will design tools for multi-step workflows, implement retrieval over HR documents, and establish deterministic logic where needed.

Qualifications

• Production-grade Python development on a shared codebase.
• Experience shipping with major model APIs (Anthropic, OpenAI, Azure).
• Hands-on AI engineer with tool use and structured outputs.
• Experience with LLM-based agents and multi-step workflows.
• Knowledge of retrieval and hybrid search approaches.
• Experience deploying to Azure and containerized environments.
• Ability to work with government data with reliability status.

Responsibilities

• Build and design LLM-based agents and tools with end-to-end workflows.
• Extend MCP server and APIs used by agents to read docs and test cases.
• Host and operate a hosted service with containerization and IAM.
• Implement retrieval over HR/pay documents with embeddings and hybrid search.
• Create evaluation sets and regression tests for AI features.
• Integrate outputs with Azure DevOps and Microsoft 365 agents.
• Deliver pipelines for new requirement workbooks and prepare outputs.
• Propose new AI use cases across HR and payroll testing.

Skills

Python

LLM integration

Agentic systems

Retrieval (RAG)

Evaluation metrics

Backend hosting

Data handling

AI-assisted development

Communication

Government data knowledge

Docker

FastAPI

Azure deployment

Tools

Azure

MCP protocol

Copilot Studio

Power Automate

Kubernetes

OpenAI/Azure OpenAI

Job description

Introduction

Brunel is currently seeking a Agentic AI Engineer to support a government project on a remote (EST hours in Canada) Contract role.

Role summary

We are building AI-assisted automation for a large HR and payroll programme: agents and pipelines that turn business requirements and test-case workbooks into test cases, validated staging data and reviewer-ready evidence. The core is already working and in use. We need a hands-on AI engineer to build, host and enhance these agents with us, take on delivery work using them, and bring new ideas on what AI can do next for HR and Pay.

This is a developer role. The person writes production code, measures what it does, and ships.

What you will do

• Build agents. Design and implement LLM-based agents and tools: tool and function calling, structured outputs, multi-step workflows, human-in-the-loop approval, prompt and context design.
• Build the tool layer. Extend our MCP (Model Context Protocol) server and APIs that agents call to read requirements, agreements, process maps, reference test cases and product documentation.
• Host and operate. Take agents from a local, single-user setup to a hosted service: containerized backend, identity and access control, audit logging, secrets management, deployment on Azure.
• Retrieval and knowledge. Build retrieval over HR and pay documents (collective agreements, process catalogues, test libraries): chunking, embeddings, hybrid search, re-ranking, with measured retrieval quality.
• Evaluate. Build labelled evaluation sets and regression tests for every AI feature; report accuracy, precision and recall; keep deterministic logic deterministic where a rule beats a prompt.
• Integrate. Connect outputs to Azure DevOps test management, and build Microsoft 365 agents (Copilot Studio, Agent Builder, Power Automate, Teams, SharePoint) for reviewer feedback and Q&A inside the tenant.
• Deliver with the tooling. Run the pipelines on new requirement workbooks, resolve what they flag, reconcile counts, and prepare outputs for review.
• Bring ideas. Propose and prototype new uses of AI across HR and pay testing: coverage analysis, scenario generation, defect triage, process-to-requirement mapping.

Must-have skills

• Python, 5+ years. Production code on a shared codebase: typing, pytest, git branches and pull requests, code review.
• LLM application engineering, 12+ months shipped. Direct experience with at least one major model API (Anthropic, OpenAI, Azure OpenAI): tool use, structured output, streaming, token and cost management, prompt caching.
• Agentic systems. Built multi-step agents with tools, memory and approval gates; familiar with MCP and at least one agent framework or SDK.
• Retrieval (RAG). Embeddings, vector stores, hybrid search, chunking strategy, and how to evaluate retrieval before building on it.
• Evaluation. Labelled datasets, metrics, regression suites for non-deterministic systems; can explain why a number moved.
• Backend and hosting. FastAPI or equivalent, Docker, REST, authentication and authorization, logging, deployment to Azure (App Service, Container Apps or AKS), CI/CD.
• Data handling. Messy multi-sheet Excel and CSV at scale with openpyxl or pandas; reconciliation that adds up; SQL.
• AI-assisted development. Works fluently with AI coding assistants day to day and reviews their output critically.
• Communication. Clear written English; documents what a system understood and what it refused; drafts precise questions when something is unclear.
• Able to work with Government of Canada data: Reliability Status held or obtainable.

Nice-to-have skills

• Microsoft 365 agent stack: Copilot Studio, Agent Builder, Power Automate, Power Platform, Azure AI Foundry, Semantic Kernel or Autogen.
• HCM or payroll platforms (Dayforce, Workday, SAP SuccessFactors, PeopleSoft) or public-sector HR and pay, including collective agreements and classification.
• Document AI: PDF and image extraction, OCR, Visio or diagram parsing.
• Observability for LLM apps: tracing, evaluation dashboards, cost reporting.
• Security for AI systems: prompt injection defense, data boundaries, tenant DLP.
• French.

What We Offer

Why work with Brunel? We are proud to offer exciting career opportunities from over 100 offices globally in 42 countries. Advancing your career takes time and effort – let us match you to your ideal position.

About Us

Brunel has a reputation for working with some of the best in the business. That’s what we continually strive for. Brunel provides the global recruitment and workforce services you need to lead your industry. With 50 years of market experience in Renewable Energy, Automotive, Oil & Gas, Life Sciences, Mining and Infrastructure, we help you finish major projects safely, compliantly, on-time, within budget and at the highest quality, so you can keep growing – anywhere in the world.