AI Engineer (Hands-On, Remote)

Western Environmental; Metro Manila; Remote; PHP 600,000 - 1,000,000; Full time

Benefits offered by this job

Employed through EOR in your country

Fully remote Philippines with Manila-t

Salary reviews after six months

Trips to Perth during first year

Job summary

Western Environmental seeks a solo-builder to design and deliver production-ready software around large language models for data-driven remediation and regulatory work. You will develop end-to-end pipelines in Python, enabling thousands of documents and records to be stored, searched, and reported efficiently.

You will work remotely from the Philippines, communicating with engineers and scientists in multiple countries. Expect to move quickly, learn, and expand capabilities as the role matures.

Qualifications

• Strong Python and production-grade software engineering skills.
• Experience building systems using large language models used by others.
• Ability to design end-to-end workflows with retrieval and tool usage.
• Comfortable explaining decisions in writing to engineers/scientists in another country.

Responsibilities

• Build and operate systems with large language models used by 40+ staff.
• Create searchable data stores and automation for data handling and reporting.
• Implement guardrails for client and project data safety.
• Develop capability to enable engineers to transition into the work.
• Deliver solutions with a focus on reliability and remote collaboration.

Skills

Python

Language models

Retrieval

Agentic workflows

Technical writing

Tools

Claude

Model Context Protocol

Copilot

Power Platform

Job description

An environmental remediation and technology company of about forty people.

Head office in West Perth, working across Australia and Southeast Asia.

We clean up contaminated land, decommission industrial plant and develop our own treatment technology.

We are not a software company, which is exactly why this role exists.

What You'll Be Doing

First, make the systems work:

Laboratory data and field records that take a week of manual handling before anyone can analyse them.

Several thousand technical documents, standards, and past reports that nobody can search properly, so the same question gets answered from scratch every time.

Regulatory reporting where the format is rigid, the content is not, and the report creation takes large amounts of time creating documents and spreadsheets.

Then, get forty people using it:

Most are technical but not software people, and some are sceptical with reason. Make the tools good enough that people choose to use them.

Put sensible guard rails around client and project data so people can use the tools safely.

This half of the job matters as much as the building, and most of this would be done remotely.

Then, build the capability into the business:

Two of our engineers want to move into this work. Developing them is part of the role.

You would stay the person who designs and builds. This is not a step towards managing a team.

Internal First, Then External

We expect some of what you build to become commercial in its own right. That intention is real but the detail is undefined.

The Stack

Claude, the Model Context Protocol and Python.

If your background is Copilot and the Power Platform, this is not a good fit, and we would rather you knew before you applied.

About You

You have built systems with large language models that other people use. Retrieval, agentic workflows, tool use, evaluation. Not prototypes that never left your laptop.

Strong Python.

You can hold a technical conversation in English, written and spoken, with people who are not developers. This matters more here than in most roles, because almost everything you do will be explained in writing to engineers and scientists in another country.

You are curious, you pick up new tools because they are better, and you are comfortable working out loud when you do not yet know the answer.

You are comfortable being the only person doing this work, and comfortable saying when you need help.

You can explain a decision, including one that turned out to be wrong.

If you have five years and a track record of building and delivering products, apply. We are not counting years.

What we are Not Looking for

A research background or a doctorate. We need working systems, not papers.

A manager. There is no team. You would be building things yourself every week, including the unglamorous parts.

Someone who needs an established platform or a large team to work against.

You report to a company director. There is no layer between you and the decision.

No existing platform, no committee and no legacy system to work around. You choose the tools.

Benefits

• Employed through an employer of record in your own country with local entitlements, tax and social security managed appropriately.
• Salary reviewed at six months, with a compensation discussion at twelve.
• Fully remote throughout Philippines, with a head office time zone that lines up with Manila.
• Real problems attached to physical work. Contaminated sites, industrial decommissioning and treatment technology we own, which you are welcome to go and see.
• One or two trips to Perth in the first year, including field time, paid for and built into the job.