Lead AI Systems Architect – Hybrid (Chicago/Peoria)

Cullerton Group; Chicago (IL); Hybrid; USD 118,000 - 168,000; Full time

Benefits offered by this job

Health insurance

Vision and dental insurance

401k plan

Holiday pay

Job summary

Cullerton Group seeks a Lead Software Engineer to architect AI-driven software platforms, focusing on Java backend systems, distributed architectures, and hands-on AI integration. You will lead multi-agent AI initiatives, establish standards, and mentor teams while advancing AI-powered development tools.

The role is hybrid in Chicago or Peoria, IL (Chicago preferred), with 2 onsite days/week, a 12-month contract with extension potential, and compensation up to $104/hr plus full benefits.

Qualifications

• Bachelor’s or Master’s degree in a related field with substantial experience.
• Deep hands-on Java backend development including microservices and API design.
• Strong software architecture and experience in large-scale distributed systems.
• Extensive AWS, Docker, and Kubernetes experience.
• Hands-on experience building production-level AI agents and agentic development patterns.
• Experience with vector databases (e.g., Pinecone, Milvus, Chroma, pgvector).
• Experience with Generative AI and LLM-powered applications, AI agents, or intelligent automation platforms.
• Familiarity with Model Context Protocol (MCP) and AI coding assistants.
• Experience leading architectural initiatives and mentoring multiple teams.

Responsibilities

• Architect and develop multi-agent and stateful AI systems using modern frameworks.
• Integrate foundation models through secure APIs while managing costs and rate limits.
• Design RAG and semantic-search architectures combining relational data with vectors.
• Lead architecture for Java backend systems, APIs, microservices, and cloud-native apps.
• Establish engineering standards and governance across multiple teams.
• Integrate AI development tools into workflows and promote responsible AI development.
• Mentor engineers and drive architecture reviews, RFCs, automation, and modernization.

Skills

Java backend development

Distributed systems architecture

Architecture leadership

AI/LLM integration

Education

Bachelor’s degree

Master’s degree

Tools

LangChain

LangGraph

AutoGen

CrewAI

Docker

Kubernetes

AWS

Pinecone

Milvus

Chroma

pgvector

Claude

GPT

Windsurf

Job description

Cullerton Group seeks a Lead Software Engineer to architect AI-driven software platforms, focusing on Java backend systems, distributed architectures, and hands-on AI integration. You will lead multi-agent AI initiatives, establish standards, and mentor teams while advancing AI-powered development tools.

The role is hybrid in Chicago or Peoria, IL (Chicago preferred), with 2 onsite days/week, a 12-month contract with extension potential, and compensation up to $104/hr plus full benefits.