AI Engineering Leader: Scale Production AI Systems

Axial Search; United States; On-site; USD 200,000 - 350,000; Full time

Job summary

Axial Search in the United States seeks a senior AI/ML engineering leader to build and scale a high-impact team delivering production AI systems. You will own end-to-end delivery from data pipelines to model serving, collaborate with product and data science, and establish robust engineering practices that balance speed with reliability.

The role requires 5+ years hands-on AI/ML experience with leadership, strong Python, PyTorch or TensorFlow, and a track record of guiding teams through complex

Qualifications

• 5+ years of hands-on AI/ML engineering experience, with at least 2 years in a leadership or senior technical role managing engineers or large-scope projects.
• Proven track record shipping production AI systems - model serving, inference optimization, data pipelines, or similar - not just research or prototyping.
• Strong foundation in Python and familiarity with modern AI/ML frameworks (PyTorch, TensorFlow, or equivalent) and MLOps tooling.
• Experience leading or mentoring technical teams through complex problems and setting quality standards that others follow.
• Ability to think strategically about AI engineering challenges while remaining hands-on enough to unblock teams and validate technical approaches.

Responsibilities

• Lead and grow an AI engineering team - hiring talent, mentoring engineers, and setting technical standards that balance innovation velocity with sustainability
• Own the end-to-end delivery of AI/ML systems from exploration through production deployment, including model training pipelines, inference infrastructure, and monitoring
• Partner with product and data science teams to translate business requirements into technical roadmaps and prioritize work across competing demands
• Drive architecture decisions for AI systems at scale - data pipelines, model serving, experiment tracking, and observability - ensuring solutions are reliable and maintainable
• Build and refine engineering processes for AI development, including code review standards, testing frameworks, and deployment practices tailored to model-driven workflows
• Identify and mitigate technical risks in production AI systems, including model drift, data quality issues, and performance degradation
• Communicate progress, blockers, and technical tradeoffs to cross-functional stakeholders and senior leadership

Skills

Leadership

Hands-on AI/ML engineering

Mentoring engineers

Strategic thinking about AI

Communication

Tools

PyTorch

TensorFlow

MLOps tooling

Job description

Axial Search in the United States seeks a senior AI/ML engineering leader to build and scale a high-impact team delivering production AI systems. You will own end-to-end delivery from data pipelines to model serving, collaborate with product and data science, and establish robust engineering practices that balance speed with reliability.

The role requires 5+ years hands-on AI/ML experience with leadership, strong Python, PyTorch or TensorFlow, and a track record of guiding teams through complex