Director of AI

Openkrill; United States; Hybrid; USD 180,000 - 250,000; Full time

Benefits offered by this job

Generous vacation

Flexible work

Training budget

Inclusive culture

Job summary

APPLY is seeking a Director of AI to lead the design and delivery of AI-enabled products and platforms across client engagements. This senior, client-facing role combines AI and software engineering expertise with consulting judgment, product thinking, and technical leadership.

You will help clients move from AI ambition to working solutions—from identifying valuable opportunities and rapidly validating ideas to engineering, deploying, and operating secure, scalable AI applications.

Qualifications

• 10+ years in software/data/ML disciplines with AI/ML leadership
• Production-ready AI/ML applications experience
• Strong software engineering foundations: APIs, data, security, cloud
• Hands-on Python and modern AI/engineering frameworks
• LLMs, RAG, context engineering, agentic workflows, evaluation
• Enterprise data grounding: structured data, documents, vector stores
• Evaluation and error-analysis for probabilistic systems
• Balance quality, latency, cost, security, UX
• Cloud-native architecture and production deployment on major clouds
• Consulting/professional services or client-facing experience
• Ability to navigate executive, product, and engineering domains
• Excellent technical communication for diverse audiences
• CS/SE/AI/data-related degree or equivalent experience

Responsibilities

• Lead AI applications from discovery to production and scale
• Identify AI opportunities with client executives and translate to roadmaps
• Design AI apps combining models, data, APIs, and UX
• Guide agentic workflows, retrieval augmentation, enterprise search
• Decide when to use deterministic software vs ML/LLMs
• Establish evaluation-driven development with datasets and metrics
• Ensure reliability, observability, scalability, security, cost
• Guide CI/CD, model/prompt versioning, monitoring, testing
• Provide hands-on leadership via prototyping and reviews
• Use AI-assisted development with governance and oversight
• Support proposals, workshops, designs and estimates
• Develop reusable AI patterns, architectures, accelerators
• Mentor teams and grow APPLY’s AI capability

Skills

AI leadership

Client-facing

Python

Cloud infrastructure

LLMs / RAG

MLOps / LLMOps

Architecture design

Executive communication

Data engineering basics

Education

Bachelor's degree in Computer Science or related field

Tools

GCP

AWS

Azure

Docker

Job description

ABOUT APPLY

APPLY is the Agentic Customer Experience (ACx) partner for the world's most ambitious consumer and entertainment brands. We bring together deep domain expertise across Retail, CPG, Sports, and Media with AI-native delivery capability, designing and delivering agentic solutions that turn CX vision into commercial reality. We are the partner of choice for brands like Arc'teryx, NFL, Lululemon, and Kraft Heinz. For more information, visit applydigital.com.

LOCATION: APPLY is hybrid/remote friendly. The preferred candidate should be based in Canada, working in hours that align to ET (Eastern Timezone) or PT (Pacific Timezone).

THE ROLE

Are you an experienced AI engineering leader who can turn complex business problems into reliable, production-ready AI solutions? Do you enjoy working directly with clients while staying close enough to the technology to shape architectures, guide engineers, and resolve critical delivery challenges?

APPLY is seeking a Director of AI to lead the design and delivery of AI-enabled products and platforms across client engagements. This senior, client-facing role combines AI and software engineering expertise with consulting judgment, product thinking, and technical leadership.

You will help clients move from AI ambition to working solutions—from identifying valuable opportunities and rapidly validating ideas to engineering, deploying, and operating secure, scalable AI applications. You will serve as a senior technical authority while contributing hands‑on expertise through architecture, prototyping, technical reviews, and delivery oversight.

You will also help advance APPLY's AI engineering capability by developing reusable patterns, standards, accelerators, and delivery practices.

RESPONSIBILITIES

• Lead the technical strategy, architecture, and delivery of AI applications from discovery and experimentation through production and scale.
• Work with client executives, product leaders, architects, and engineering teams to identify valuable AI opportunities and translate them into achievable technical roadmaps.
• Design AI applications that combine models, enterprise data, APIs, software components, user experiences, and human workflows.
• Guide the implementation of agentic workflows, retrieval‑augmented generation, enterprise search, predictive models, and AI capabilities embedded in digital products.
• Determine when to use deterministic software, machine learning, large language models, human review, or a combination of approaches.
• Establish evaluation‑driven development practices, including test datasets, error analysis, deterministic checks, model‑based evaluation, and business outcome measurement.
• Ensure solutions meet production requirements for reliability, observability, scalability, latency, maintainability, security, and cost.
• Guide practices for CI/CD, model and prompt versioning, monitoring, tracing, regression testing, and ongoing optimization.
• Provide hands‑on technical leadership through prototyping, architecture reviews, code reviews, troubleshooting, and delivery oversight.
• Use AI‑assisted development and coding agents effectively while maintaining appropriate verification, security, and human oversight.
• Support proposals, discovery workshops, solution design, estimates, and executive presentations.
• Develop reusable AI engineering patterns, reference architectures, accelerators, and delivery standards.
• Contribute to hiring, technical mentorship, and the continued growth of APPLY’s AI capability.

REQUIREMENTS

• 10+ years of experience across software engineering, data engineering, machine learning, or related technology disciplines, including significant experience leading AI or ML solutions.
• Demonstrated experience designing, building, and operating AI or machine learning applications in production—not only proofs of concept.
• Strong software engineering foundation, including system design, APIs, data architecture, testing, security, cloud infrastructure, and production operations.
• Hands‑on proficiency in Python and experience with modern application, data, and AI engineering frameworks.
• Strong understanding of LLMs, RAG, context engineering, agentic workflows, tool use, structured outputs, and model evaluation.
• Experience grounding AI systems in enterprise data, including structured data, documents, semantic models, vector stores, or knowledge graphs.
• Experience establishing evaluation and error‑analysis practices for systems with probabilistic outputs.
• Ability to balance model quality, reliability, latency, cost, security, and user experience.
• Experience with cloud‑native architecture and production deployment on GCP, AWS, or Azure.
• Familiarity with containers, CI/CD, observability, and MLOps or LLMOps practices.
• Demonstrated success in a consulting, professional‑services, or complex client‑facing environment.
• Ability to move comfortably between executive conversations, product decisions, architecture discussions, and detailed technical problem‑solving.
• Excellent communication skills with both technical and non‑technical audiences.
• A degree in computer science, software engineering, artificial intelligence, data science, or a related field—or equivalent professional experience.

NICE TO HAVES

• Experience delivering AI solutions in regulated, privacy‑sensitive, or large‑scale enterprise environments.
• Experience with model fine‑tuning, open‑source models, multimodal AI, voice agents, or computer‑use agents.
• Experience implementing enterprise AI security controls, including prompt‑injection defenses, tool permissions, and human approval gates.
• Experience building internal AI platforms, reusable agent frameworks, or developer enablement capabilities.
• Experience contributing to organizational AI strategy, operating models, or technical standards.
• Professional certifications or significant delivery experience with GCP, Snowflake, Databricks, or comparable platforms.

LIFE AT APPLY

People are at the core of everything we do at APPLY. We provide you with modern tools, systems and approaches, value your time, safety, and health, and strive to build a work community where you can thrive and grow. Here are a few benefits we offer to support you:

Agentic Delivery: Our people work in a modern way to deliver client outcomes. Broaden your skills on a range of engagements with international brands that have a global impact.

An inclusive and safe environment: We’re truly committed to building a culture where you are celebrated and everyone feels welcome and safe.

AI & Strategic Upskilling: Accelerate your professional growth with generous training budgets and mentorship, with a specific focus on Agentic AI expertise and the critical human skills required for the future of work.

Generous vacation policy: Work-life balance is key to our team’s success, so we offer flexible personal time off (PTO); allowing ample time away from work to promote overall well‑being.

Customizable benefits: Tailor your extended health and dental plan to your needs, priorities, and preferences.

Flexible work arrangements: We work in a variety of ways, from remote, to in-office, to a blend of both.

APPLY is a safe, respectful, and inclusive community where differences are celebrated. We are committed to equal opportunity and fostering a workplace where everyone belongs. Learn more in our Diversity, Equity, and Inclusion (DEI) section. For recruitment accommodations, please email [e-mail].