10207

Zohorecruit

Chicago (IL)

Hybrid

USD 150,000 - 210,000

Full time

14 days+

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Job summary

Zohorecruit is seeking a visionary Lead Software Engineer to architect AI-powered platforms, bridging core full-stack development with large language model (LLM) integration. You will lead multiple engineering teams and drive secure, scalable solutions in a hybrid Chicago/Peoria setup.

You will mentor engineers, define technical strategy, own architecture reviews, and collaborate with product and data teams to deliver production-grade systems with velocity, reliability, and security.

Qualifications

Bachelor’s degree in CS or EE required.
10+ years of software engineering experience.
2+ years in a technical leadership role.
Strong Java, APIs and microservices background.
Experience with Generative AI and AI agents.

Responsibilities

Architect AI-powered platforms and multi-agent workflows.
Lead engineering teams; establish standards and governance.
Drive AI integration and secure, scalable software solutions.
Mentor engineers and drive architectural reviews.
Collaborate with product and data teams to deliver production-grade systems.

Skills

Java

Microservices

AWS

APIs

AI/LLM integration

Leadership

Education

Bachelor’s degree in Computer Science or Electrical Engineering

Master’s degree

Tools

Docker

Kubernetes

LangChain

OpenAI API

Job description

Chicago, United States | Posted on 09/22/2026

Location: Peoria, IL and/or Chicago office (Chicagopreferred) - Hybrid; must go in office 2 days a week

Duration: 12 Months,possibility to be extended

Exp: 10-12 Years not more than 15 yrs

Description:

We are seeking a visionary LeadSoftware Engineer to architect and deliver next-generation software platformsdriven by Artificial Intelligence and Agentic workflows. In this seniorleadership role, you will bridge the gap between core full-stack applicationdevelopment and cutting-edge Large Language Model (LLM) integration. You willwork with several high-performing engineering teams, championing the adoptionof AI coding assistants to radically accelerate our internal developer velocitywhile designing reliable, production-grade AI systems for our customers.

Position’s Contributions to Work Group : TechnicalArchitecture & AI Integration

Design and orchestrate multi-agent workflows andstateful AI systems using modern frameworks like LangChain, LangGraph, AutoGen,or CrewAI.
Integrate foundation models (e.g., AnthropicClaude, OpenAI GPT, and Google Gemini) via secure API gateways, managing tokenlimits, costs, and rate-limiting.
Architect data models optimized for AI-nativestructures, integrating relational databases with vector databases for semanticsearch and Retrieval-Augmented Generation (RAG).
Implement robust white-box testing andcontinuous evaluation metrics to monitor AI outputs for factual correctness,hallucinations, and safety compliance.
Champion secure, reliable, and scalable softwaresolutions through architectural leadership, risk management, and continuousimprovement of engineering practices.

Typical task breakdown:

Technical Leadership & Workflow Optimization:

Mentor and scale an engineering team,establishing engineering standards, best practices and architectural governancefor secure coding, continuous integration, and cloud-native deployment.
Drive AI-assisted engineering velocity byintegrating next-gen development tools (e.g., Cursor, Claude Code, Windsurf)into the team's daily Software Development Life Cycle (SDLC).
Establish governance policies and coachdevelopers on the responsible use of AI, focusing on input data sensitivity,license compliance, and security guardrails.
Evaluate existing systems, services, APIs, anddata models to identify opportunities for modernization, scalability, andperformance improvements.

Influence Across Teams & Champion DeveloperExperience:

Facilitate technical leadership forums withProduct Owners, Technical Leads, Architects, and Engineering Managers.
Drive conversations around architecture,engineering health, technical debt, AI adoption, and continuous improvement.
Mentor engineers and technical leaders on systemdesign, software architecture, and engineering excellence.
Foster collaborative decision-making througharchitecture reviews, RFCs, and technical discussions.
Promote self-service engineering capabilitiesand platform enablement.
Drive automation initiatives that improveproductivity and software quality.

Interaction with team :

Significant interaction required with Scrumteam. Interaction during all scrum ceremonies such as Daily Standups, SprintPlanning, Grooming, Retro, Demo etc. Also need to interact with team for PRReviews, also need to engage with other teams as needed.

Education & Experience Required:

Bachelor’s degree in Computer science orElectrical engineering or related field, Plus 10+ years exp
Master Degree plus 8+ years exp

Core Software Engineering

Backend Systems: Deep proficiency in backend environments,microservices architectures, and API design using Java.
Cloud & DevOps: Extensive experience withcontainerization (Docker, Kubernetes) and public cloud infrastructure like AWS
Orchestration & Tooling: Hands-on experiencewith production-level AI agents, prompt engineering, and advanced Agentic PDLCpatterns.
Vector Databases: Practical knowledge of vectortechnologies such as Pinecone, Milvus, Chroma, or pgvector.
AI Tool Fluency: Demonstrated mastery of AIcoding assistants and a firm understanding of Model Context Protocol (MCP) tomediate agent connections with external databases.

Technical Skills:

8+ years of professional software engineeringexperience and 2+ years in a technical leadership role.
Proven experience designing and deliveringlarge-scale distributed systems.
Strong expertise in software architecture, APIs,microservices, cloud-native applications, and modern engineering practices.
Experience influencing multiple engineeringteams and leading organization-wide technical initiatives.
Strong communication, collaboration, andstakeholder management skills.
Demonstrated ability to mentor engineers anddrive technical excellence.
Experience with Generative AI, AI agents,LLM-powered applications, or intelligent automation platforms.
Experience with AI development tools, codingassistants, and modern developer productivity platforms.

Experience Requirements

Overall Experience

10+ years of experience with a Bachelor's degree.
With a Master's degree, the requirement can be reduced to 8+ years.
Candidates with significantly more experience are acceptable; the hiring manager explicitly confirmed that more experience is fine/preferred.

Leadership

2+ years of technicalleadership experience required.
The role is primarily a technical leadershipposition , with hands-on technical involvement.
Leadership experience does not necessarily need to come from formal people management.

Java Development – Critical Requirement

A strong Java development background is required.

The hiring manager clarified that candidates should not simply be strong AI/GenAI leaders with limited Java exposure.

The individual needs to:

Understand the existing Java codebase.
Be able to evaluate AI-generated recommendations involving Java.
Determine whether AI-generated recommendations are technically appropriate.
Make or drive the necessary changes.
Understand the implications of changes to the Java codebase.
Be comfortable working with Java repositories hosted in GitHub.

A candidate who is highly experienced in AI but primarily codes in Python or another language without strong Java knowledge would likely not be suitable.

GenAI / AI Experience

Strong practical experience with Generative AI is a major requirement.

The role requires experience with areas such as: