AI Solutions Architect

Hardshell; United States; Hybrid; USD 144,000 - 176,000; Full time

Job summary

Hardshell is seeking a solutions architect to lead enterprise AI pilots, guiding technical discovery, tailored demonstrations, and production handoff. You will work with security, data, and compliance stakeholders to relate findings to threat models and reporting frameworks.

The role requires deploying AI systems at scale, integrating with customer environments, and shaping future pilot delivery. Hybrid work in Charlottesville, VA or remote in the Eastern time zone is offered.

Qualifications

• Five+ years in solutions architecture or sales engineering, including security/AI work.
• Experience deploying enterprise AI systems (RAG, vector databases, LLM APIs).
• Ability to write code (e.g., Python) for integrations.

Responsibilities

• Map customers' AI knowledge bases, retrieval designs, data sources, and access controls to define a pilot.
• Build demonstrations around customer use cases and integrate the solution into customer environments.
• Lead pilots from setup to final review of exposure tests and telemetry.
• Explain findings to security, data, and compliance stakeholders with threat model & reporting context.
• Support production conversion via architecture planning, security reviews, and handoff.
• Document customer feedback and technical needs for engineering and product teams.

Skills

Solutions architecture

Sales engineering

AI infrastructure

Job description

Role overview

Lead the technical work that helps enterprise security, data, and AI teams assess AI systems before connecting them to sensitive information. You'll guide customer engagements from technical discovery and tailored demonstrations through pilot deployment, findings review, and production handoff, while helping shape how future pilots are delivered.

Responsibilities

• Map customers' AI knowledge bases, retrieval designs, data sources, and access controls to define what a pilot should evaluate.
• Build demonstrations around customer use cases and integrate the solution in customer environments.
• Lead pilots from initial setup through a final review of exposure tests and telemetry.
• Explain findings to security, data, and compliance stakeholders, relating them to relevant threat models and reporting frameworks.
• Support production conversion through architecture planning, security reviews, questionnaires, and handoff.
• Document customer feedback and technical needs for engineering and product teams.

Requirements

• At least five years in solutions architecture, solutions or sales engineering, or forward-deployed engineering; security, data, or AI infrastructure experience is relevant.
• Practical experience deploying enterprise AI systems, such as retrieval-augmented generation, vector databases, language model APIs, or assistants connected to company data.
• Working knowledge of cloud environments, identity and access management, and enterprise handling of sensitive data.
• Ability to write code, such as Python, to complete integrations independently.
• Clear communication with both technical teams and business stakeholders.

Benefits and work setup

Full-time role, hybrid in Charlottesville, Virginia, or remote in the Eastern time zone. Compensation is listed up to $160,000.