AI Engineering Manager – GenAI Platform Leader

Zs Associates; Chicago (IL); Hybrid; USD 180,000 - 240,000; Full time

Benefits offered by this job

Hybrid work model

Travel opportunities

Total rewards package

Job summary

ZS Associates seeks an AI Engineering Manager to own end-to-end architecture and delivery of GenAI-enabled platform systems. You will lead multi-tier architectures across API, data, and AI layers while guiding teams through design reviews and production readiness.

You will partner with Product, AI/ML, DevOps, and Consulting to translate business needs into scalable technical solutions, mentoring engineers along the way.

Qualifications

• Deep software engineering foundations in CS, data structures, algorithms, and system design.
• Engineering leadership experience leading teams while remaining hands-on.
• Experience building and scaling large-scale, distributed, multi-tier applications across backend, services, data, and AI layers.
• Strong backend skills with Python; familiarity with FastAPI/Flask or similar frameworks.
• Understanding of distributed systems, microservices, API design, data modeling, and storage systems.
• Hands-on experience building production-grade GenAI/LLM systems, incl. prompts, model integrations, and AI workflows.
• Fluency in English; client-first mentality and clear communication of trade-offs.

Responsibilities

• Lead architecture and design for large-scale distributed systems spanning frontend, APIs, services, data, and AI layers.
• Define engineering standards, design patterns, service boundaries, and data models.
• Architect GenAI-enabled systems using LLMs, prompt pipelines, model APIs, and AI workflows.
• Guide engineers through design/code reviews and technical debt resolution at scale.
• Own delivery across parallel workstreams with planning, risk identification, and execution.
• Ensure systems are observable, reliable, and production-ready with cloud-native CI/CD.

Skills

Python

API design

Distributed systems

GenAI/LLM

Engineering leadership

Microservices

English language

Tools

FastAPI

Flask

Job description

ZS Associates seeks an AI Engineering Manager to own end-to-end architecture and delivery of GenAI-enabled platform systems. You will lead multi-tier architectures across API, data, and AI layers while guiding teams through design reviews and production readiness.

You will partner with Product, AI/ML, DevOps, and Consulting to translate business needs into scalable technical solutions, mentoring engineers along the way.