Lead Python Engineer (AI-Powered Financial Assistant)

EPAM Systems Inc; United States; Remote; USD 140,000 - 190,000; Full time

Job summary

EPAM Systems Inc in the United States seeks a Lead Python Engineer to drive the design and delivery of an AI-powered financial assistant platform, shaping product direction and leading a small, high-performing team across backend services and interfaces.

You will own production-grade APIs with Python and FastAPI, implement robust AI workflows with safeguards, perform automated testing and observability, and mentor engineers while maintaining security, reliability, and maintainable code in

Qualifications

• 5+ years of professional Python software engineering experience.
• Strong technical leadership and mentoring in senior teams.
• System design experience for production backend services and APIs.
• Deep FastAPI experience or comparable Python web frameworks.
• Hands-on AI-DLC and Gen AI-assisted development workflows.
• Strong LLM application experience, including prompt design.
• Proven AI evaluation and regression testing skills.
• Strong AI security knowledge, privacy and guardrails.
• High autonomy to deliver from vague requirements through implementation.
• Advanced English communication (C1).

Responsibilities

• Lead design and delivery of backend services for an AI-powered financial assistant
• Define system architecture balancing quality, latency, reliability, and cost
• Build production-grade APIs using Python and FastAPI with testing and observability
• Implement LLM-powered workflows with safeguards and validation
• Establish automated AI evaluations, test datasets, and monitoring
• Harden applications with security controls for sensitive data
• Collaborate with product and business users to refine requirements
• Drive code quality through reviews and maintainable practices
• Integrate AI-assisted programming and verify generated code
• Troubleshoot production issues with incident response and RCA
• Guide technical decisions in a low-process environment

Skills

Python

FastAPI

API design

LLM apps

AI testing

Security

Mentoring

Leadership

Autonomy

English (C1)

Tools

AWS

Kubernetes

Terraform

ReactJS

Next.js

Job description

We are seeking a Lead Python Engineer to build a next-generation AI-powered financial assistant platform, rapidly iterating on chat, reporting, and bespoke interfaces used in investment workflows. You will own end-to-end delivery in a small, highly capable team and help shape product direction.

Responsibilities

• Lead design and delivery of backend services for an AI-powered financial assistant
• Define system architecture that balances quality, latency, reliability, and cost for AI features
• Build production-grade APIs using Python and FastAPI with strong testing and observability
• Implement LLM-powered workflows with robust safeguards, validation, and failure handling
• Establish automated AI evaluations, test datasets, regression suites, and monitoring for model behavior
• Harden applications with security controls for sensitive data, auditing, and access management
• Collaborate with product and business users to refine requirements and ship iterative improvements
• Drive code quality through reviews, standards, and maintainable engineering practices
• Integrate AI-assisted programming and coding agents while critically validating generated code
• Troubleshoot production issues with disciplined incident response and root-cause analysis
• Guide technical decisions in a low-process environment and keep delivery momentum high

Requirements

• 5+ years of professional software engineering experience with Python
• Strong technical leadership and mentoring experience in senior engineering teams
• Proven system design experience for production backend services and APIs
• Deep FastAPI experience or strong experience with comparable Python web frameworks
• Hands-on experience with AI-DLC and Gen AI assisted development workflows
• Strong Large Language Models (LLM) application experience, including prompt design and integration patterns
• Proven AI evaluation and quality engineering skills, including automated evals and regression testing
• Strong AI security knowledge, including privacy, access control, prompt-injection risks, and guardrails
• High autonomy and self-governance skills to deliver from vague requirements through implementation
• Strong product judgment skills to identify edge cases and prioritize reliability and maintainability
• Advanced English proficiency (C1, Advanced)
• Nice to have Amazon Web Services Kubernetes Terraform ReactJS Next.js