Principal Engineer, Engineering AI Productivity

Confluent; Lincoln (NE); Remote; USD 285,000 - 342,000; Full time

Benefits offered by this job

Equity

Job summary

Confluent is seeking a strategic and hands-on technical leader to define and drive internal agentic AI capabilities across our platform. You will collaborate with Engineering, Security, and IT to scale AI usage that accelerates value for customers and the business.

You will operationalize a vision where AI augments developers, automates routine tasks, and orchestrates intelligent workflows, with an emphasis on responsible AI governance and measurable outcomes.

Qualifications

• 8+ years driving strategic productivity initiatives in SaaS/Cloud or developer tools.
• Expertise in distributed systems and supporting infrastructure.
• Ability to lead cross-functional teams and influence senior stakeholders.
• Strong communication translating tech strategies into outcomes.
• Hands-on AI/ML platform experience with LLM integration and workflows.
• Understanding of responsible AI practices and governance.
• Ability to tie technical work to business KPIs (adoption, ROI).

Responsibilities

• Define and evangelize the AI and agentic flows strategy aligning metrics, engineering needs, and platform opportunities.
• Build a roadmap for agentic automation features, smart assistants, and AI-driven workflows.
• Identify and resolve bottlenecks across the product and software development lifecycle.
• Lead delivery of core agentic workflows to improve engineering productivity.
• Balance 60% execution and 40% strategy in practice.
• Drive measurable adoption of AI tooling and flows with internal teams.
• Define success metrics and KPIs for AI initiatives.

Skills

Strategic leadership

Cross-functional collaboration

AI initiatives

Distributed systems

Executive communication

Execution focus

ROI metrics

Cloud-native platforms

Job description

Location:

Remote, United States

Employment Type:

FullTime

Location Type:

Remote

Department

Engineering

Compensation:

$285K - $342K • Offers Equity

At Confluent, we are committed to providing competitive pay and benefits that are in line with industry standards. We analyze and carefully consider several factors when determining compensation, including work history, education, professional experience, and location. The actual pay may vary depending on your skills, qualifications, experience, and work location. In addition, Confluent offers a wide range of employee benefits. To learn more about our benefits click here (https://confluentbenefits.com) .

Overview

We're not just building better tech. We're rewriting how data moves and what the world can do with it. With Confluent, data doesn't sit still. Our platform puts information in motion, streaming in near real-time so companies can react faster, build smarter, and deliver experiences as dynamic as the world around them.

It takes a certain kind of person to join this team. Those who ask hard questions, give honest feedback, and show up for each other. No egos, no solo acts. Just smart, curious humans pushing toward something bigger, together.

One Confluent. One Team. One Data Streaming Platform.

About the Role:

We're seeking a strategic and hands-on technical leader to define and drive Confluent's internal agentic AI capabilities, and adoption of smart, automated decisioning systems for R&D productivity. In this role, you will partner across Engineering, Security, and IT to scale AI usage across our platform to accelerate value for customers and the business.

You will operationalize a vision where AI augments developers, automates routine tasks, and orchestrates intelligent workflows that unlock new usage patterns.

What You Will Do:

• Strategy & Vision
• Define and evangelize the AI and agentic flows strategy - aligning business metrics, engineering needs, and platform opportunities.
• Build a roadmap for introducing agentic automation features, smart assistants, and AI-driven workflows across all aspects of engineering.
• Identify and resolve bottlenecks across the entire product and software development life cycle.
• Cross-Functional Leadership
• Partner with Engineering, Trust and Security to integrate AI capabilities responsibly and at scale.
• Operationalize AI adoption internally and share use cases externally
• Drive complex cross-team projects requiring multi-stakeholder alignment
• Continuously raise the bar for code/architectural quality across engineering
• Execution & Delivery
• Lead the delivery of core agentic workflows that improves productivity across engineering
• Balance of hands-on contributions with effective delegation to others. Expect 60% execution and 40% strategy setting.
• Drive measurable adoption of AI tooling and flows with internal teams
• Governance & Best Practices
• Ability to adopt industry standards, ethical frameworks, guardrails, and quality metrics for AI behavior and automated flows.
• Define success metrics and KPIs (e.g., AI-driven usage lift, automation ROI, reduction in manual workflows).
• Thought Leadership
• Participate in external forums - conferences, podcasts, customer briefings on occasion
• Evolve as the technology landscape shifts
• Write internal playbooks for building and scaling agentic outcomes.

What You Will Bring:

• Technical and Product Acumen
• 8+ years driving strategic productivity initiatives, ideally in SaaS/Cloud platforms or developer tools with some proven experience in AI initiatives.
• Considered an expert in building distributed systems and/or the infrastructure and tools to support it.
• Leadership & Collaboration
• Proven ability to lead cross-functional teams and influence senior stakeholders without direct authority.
• Strong communicator who can translate complex technical strategies into impact-oriented outcomes.
• Execution Focus
• Demonstrated track record delivering products or features that generated measurable business value.
• Comfortable defining success criteria, metrics, and ROI for ambiguous, future-facing domains.
• AI/ML & Automation
• Hands-on experience with AI or adjacent AI/ML platform experience with LLM integration and workflow automation, with demonstrated appetite to build toward agentic patterns
• Deep understanding of responsible AI practices and governance.
• Customer & Business Mindset
• Passion for solving real customer problems with elegant, scalable solutions.
• Ability to tie technical efforts directly to business KPIs (adoption, retention, revenue impact).

What Gives You an Edge:

• Experience working in cloud-native platforms or developer ecosystems.
• Prior leadership in scaling internal AI platforms or driving AI adoption across large organizations.
• Background in real-time data, event-driven architecture, or platform engineering.

If you're someone looking to bring agentic system design to production scale, let's talk.

Ready to build what's next? Let's get in motion.

Come As You Are

Belonging isn't a perk here. It's the baseline. We work across time zones and backgrounds, knowing the best ideas come from different perspectives. And we make space for everyone to lead, grow, and challenge what's possible.

We're proud to be an equal opportunity workplace. Employment decisions are based on job-related criteria, without regard to race, color, religion, sex, sexual orientation, gender identity, national origin, disability, veteran status, or any other classification protected by law.

Privacy Statement

Confluent is an IBM subsidiary which has been acquired by IBM and will be integrated into the IBM organization. By proceeding with this application, you understand that Confluent will share your personal information with other IBM affiliates involved in your recruitment process, wherever these are located. More Information on how IBM protects your personal information, including the safeguards in case of cross-border data transfer, are available here (http://ibm.com/careers/us-en/privacy-policy/) .