Principal AI Platform Engineer

Compeer Financial; Mankato (MN); Hybrid; USD 133,000 - 180,000; Full time

Benefits offered by this job

Hybrid work model up to 50% remote

Flexible schedules including summer

401k with company match up to 9%

Medical, dental, vision, HSA/FSA, life

Disability and wellness programs

Vacation, holidays, parental leave

Learning and development programs

Professional membership reimbursement

Job summary

Compeer Financial is seeking an experienced Senior AI Platform Engineer to lead enterprise AI developments and governance. You will shape the AI platform strategy, build integrations for LLMs, vector search, and agentic development, and partner with architecture, security, and risk teams to ensure safe, scalable AI across the organization.

The role emphasizes mentoring engineers, advancing cloud-native practices, and translating business needs into long-term AI roadmaps.

Qualifications

• Bachelor's degree in CS or related field or equivalent experience.
• Extensive experience designing, building, and operating complex software, distributed systems, and platforms.
• Hands-on experience with AI applications using LLMs, retrieval-augmented generation, vector search, agent orchestration, and cloud AI services such as Azure OpenAI or Azure AI Foundry.
• Experience scaling responsible AI across the software lifecycle and governance, risk, privacy, and data protection considerations.

Responsibilities

• Leads AI platform engineering and adoption by building enterprise AI platforms, tools, services, and integrations for LLMs, retrieval-augmented generation, vector search, agents, and context protocols.
• Establishes AI operational excellence with guardrails, evaluation frameworks, monitoring, and cost/performance management.
• Partners on AI governance and risk with Risk, InfoSec, Legal, Compliance, and Data Governance.
• Owns AI-enabled engineering delivery for strategic initiatives from discovery through operations.
• Develops engineers and leaders through mentoring, communities of practice, and reusable guidance on AI-assisted development.
• Advances architecture, cloud-native engineering, DevSecOps, testing, CI/CD, observability, and reliability in AI projects.
• Translates strategy and needs into engineering roadmaps and high-value AI opportunities.
• Leads across organizational boundaries partnering with engineering, product, security, data, and business leaders.
• Influences without authority, communicates risks clearly, and resolves dependencies.

Skills

AI governance

LLMs

Vector search

Agent orchestration

Cloud AI

Architecture

Leadership

DevSecOps

Education

Bachelor's degree in Computer Science or related field

Tools

Azure OpenAI

Azure AI Foundry

Job description

Empowered to live. Inspired to work.
Compeer Financial is a member-owned cooperative located in Illinois, Minnesota and Wisconsin. We bring together team members with a variety of backgrounds and experiences to help provide financial services to support agriculture and rural communities. Join us in a culture that not only promotes meaningful work and professional development, but provides a flexible, hybrid work environment and excellent benefits, which empower you to thrive both personally and professionally.

How we support you:

• Hybrid model – up to 50% work from home
• Flexible schedules including ample flexibility in the summer months
• Up to 9% towards 401k (3% fixed Compeer contribution plus up to 6% match)
• Benefits: medical, dental, vision, HSA/FSA, life & AD&D insurance, short-term and long-term disability, wellness program & EAP
• Vacation, sick leave, holidays/floating holidays, parental leave, and volunteer paid time off
• Learning and development programs
• Cross-functional committee opportunities (i.e. Inclusion Council, emerging professional groups, etc.)
• Professional membership/certification reimbursement and more!

Casual/seasonal & intern team members are not eligible for benefits except for state-mandated programs.

The contributions you will make:

The highest-level individual contributor in the software engineering career framework, providing enterprise technical leadership across portfolios, products, platforms, and transformation initiatives, with a focus on leading and expanding responsible AI use across the organization. Sets enterprise AI Enablement Platform direction and partnering with Enterprise Architecture and AI Risk governance workgroup. Connects AI technology platform strategy to enterprise needs, risks, and measurable enterprise value. Advances AI-enabled engineering and Agentic AI at scale, building tools and platforms that make AI adoption safe, repeatable, and accessible. Serves as a trusted advisor to senior technology and business leaders and models the behaviors that strengthen Compeer's engineering culture.

A typical day:

• Leads AI platform engineering and adoption by building enterprise AI platforms, tools, services, and integrations for LLMs, retrieval-augmented generation, vector search, agents, Model Context Protocol, and AI-assisted and agentic software development.
• Establishes AI operational excellence through reusable components and guardrails, evaluation frameworks, monitoring, cost and performance management, output validation, production support, and responsible scaling of AI tools and agents.
• Partners on AI governance and risk with Risk Management, Information Security, Legal, Compliance, and Data Governance, translating requirements into access controls, data protection, model and vendor risk management, human oversight, auditability, and use-case risk tiering.
• Owns AI-enabled and Agentic AI engineering delivery for the most strategic and ambiguous software initiatives from discovery through sustained operation, making significant cross-boundary technical decisions and remaining accountable for quality, security, reliability, scalability, and production performance.
• Develops engineers and technical leaders through mentoring, communities of practice, training, and reusable guidance on AI-assisted development, prompt and context engineering, responsible AI, agentic development, and critical evaluation of AI-generated output.
• Advances technical mastery and engineering excellence across architecture, distributed systems, integration, cloud-native engineering, DevSecOps, testing, CI/CD, security, observability, and reliability while evaluating emerging technologies through experimentation and evidence.
• Connects engineering to business outcomes by translating Compeer's strategy, client needs, regulatory obligations, and risk into engineering strategies, investment options, build-versus-buy decisions, high-value AI opportunities, and multi-year roadmaps.
• Leads across organizational boundaries by partnering with engineering, architecture, product, security, data, operations, quality, risk, and business leaders
• Influences without authority, resolving conflicts and dependencies, and communicating risks and trade-offs clearly.

The skills and experience we prefer you have:

• Bachelor's degree in Computer Science, Software Engineering, or related discipline, or equivalent experience, with extensive experience designing, building, and operating complex, business-critical software, distributed systems, and platforms.
• Hands‑on experience designing and building AI applications and platforms using LLMs, retrieval‑augmented generation, vector search, agent orchestration, Model Context Protocol, and cloud AI services such as Azure OpenAI or Azure AI Foundry.
• Experience scaling responsible AI‑enabled engineering and Agentic AI across the software lifecycle, prompt and model versioning, quality and safety testing, cost and performance monitoring, production support, and validation of AI‑generated outcomes.
• Working knowledge of responsible AI and AI governance, model and vendor risk management, privacy, bias and fairness, auditability, human oversight, sensitive‑data protection, and translating governance requirements into practical technical controls; experience in financial services, agriculture, or another regulated industry is preferred.
• Experience leading complex solution design and strategic technical decisions across multiple portfolios, products, systems, or business domains, including architecture, integration, technology trade‑offs, engineering strategy, standards, governance, and target‑state architecture.
• Distinguished software engineering expertise across application development, APIs and integration, cloud‑native and event‑driven architectures, data, security, platforms, DevSecOps, testing, CI/CD, observability, reliability, and operational excellence.
• Ability to analyze highly complex problems, anticipate second- and third‑order effects, balance technical, security, regulatory, operational, and investment trade‑offs, and connect engineering decisions to Compeer's strategy, client needs, enterprise value, and durable multi‑year direction.
• Exceptional communication, influence, leadership, and learning agility, including the ability to advise executives and governance bodies, constructively challenge assumptions, resolve cross‑organizational dependencies, mentor senior technical talent, and rapidly evaluate and responsibly adopt emerging technologies.

How we will take care of you:

Our job titles may span more than one career level (associate, senior, principal, etc.). The actual title and base pay offered is dependent upon many factors, such as: training, transferable skills, work experience, business needs and market demands. The base pay range is subject to change and may be modified in the future. This role is eligible for variable compensation and other benefits.

Base Pay

$133,000 - $180,000 USD

Compeer Financial is an equal opportunity employer and all qualified applicants will receive consideration for employment without regard to race, color, religion, sex, national origin, disability status, protected veteran status, or any other characteristic protected by law.

Must be authorized to work for any employer in the United States. Compeer is unable to sponsor or take over sponsorship of an employment visa at this time.

Voluntary Self‑Identification

For government reporting purposes, we ask candidates to respond to the below self‑identification survey.Completion of the form is entirely voluntary. Whatever your decision, it will not be considered in the hiringprocess or thereafter. Any information that you do provide will be recorded and maintained in aconfidential file.

As set forth in Compeer Financial’s Equal Employment Opportunity policy,we do not discriminate on the basis of any protected group status under any applicable law.

If you believe you belong to any of the categories of protected veterans listed below, please indicate by making the appropriate selection.As a government contractor subject to the Vietnam Era Veterans Readjustment Assistance Act (VEVRAA), we request this information in order to measurethe effectiveness of the outreach and positive recruitment efforts we undertake pursuant to VEVRAA. Classification of protected categoriesis as follows:

A "disabled veteran" is one of the following: a veteran of the U.S. military, ground, naval or air service who is entitled to compensation (or who but for the receipt of military retired pay would be entitled to compensation) under laws administered by the Secretary of Veterans Affairs; or a person who was discharged or released from active duty because of a service‑connected disability.

A "recently separated veteran" means any veteran during the three‑year period beginning on the date of such veteran's discharge or release from active duty in the U.S. military, ground, naval, or air service.

An "active duty wartime or campaign badge veteran" means a veteran who served on active duty in the U.S. military, ground, naval or air service during a war, or in a campaign or expedition for which a campaign badge has been authorized under the laws administered by the Department of Defense.

An "Armed forces service medal veteran" means a veteran who, while serving on active duty in the U.S. military, ground, naval or air service, participated in a United States military operation for which an Armed Forces service medal was awarded pursuant to Executive Order 12985.