Senior AI Engineer / Forward Deployed Engineer

TEKsystems; Sunnyvale (CA); Hybrid; USD 110,000 - 117,000; Full time

Benefits offered by this job

Medical, dental & vision

401(k) – Pre‑tax and Roth options

Life Insurance

Short/Long-term disability

HSA / transportation benefits

Employee Assistance Program

Paid Time Off

Job summary

TEKsystems is hiring for a Contract-to-Hire AI-focused engineering role in Sunnyvale, CA. The position is hybrid (onsite Tue–Thu) with compensation of $80–$85/hr on a W2 basis, plus benefits.

This 12-month contract-to-hire opportunity places you at the forefront of enterprise AI, building production-grade AI-powered applications and agent-enabled workflows. The ideal candidate brings 5+ years in software engineering, solid production AI experience, and strong product mindset to translate

Qualifications

• 5+ years of software engineering, application development, or product engineering experience.
• Hands-on experience building and shipping production software with languages like Python, Java, Go, TypeScript, C#, or similar.
• Hands-on experience building and deploying AI applications in production environments.

Responsibilities

• Partner with business stakeholders to identify opportunities for AI-driven transformation.
• Translate ambiguous business requirements into scalable architectures and production-ready solutions.
• Design, develop, and deploy AI-powered applications, agents, copilots, and intelligent automation workflows.
• Build production-grade solutions leveraging LLMs, AI agents, MCPs, skills, tools, harnesses, and modern AI frameworks.
• Rapidly prototype and iterate to validate business value and gather stakeholder feedback.

Skills

Software engineering

AI in production

LLMs & agents

Stakeholder comms

System design

Job description

(No Sponsorship Available / Cannot Support C2C)

Location: Hybrid in Sunnyvale, CA (Tuesday-Thursday onsite)

Compensation: $80-$85/hr W2 + Benefits

Duration: 12-Month Contract-to-Hire Opportunity

WHY JOIN?

• Join a newly formed, executive-sponsored AI Transformation organization.
• Build production AI applications with enterprise-wide impact
• Work directly with business stakeholders and Senior leadership
• Help shape AI adoption across a global organization
• Opportunity to convert into a long-term role with a world-class organization

Overview

Join a newly formed, executive-sponsored AI Transformation team focused on bringing enterprise AI solutions from concept to production across a large global organization.

This team operates at the intersection of business, product, and engineering, partnering directly with stakeholders to identify high-impact opportunities, rapidly prototype solutions, and deliver AI-powered applications that drive measurable business outcomes.

We're looking for engineers who combine strong software development experience with modern AI expertise to solve business problems, build production-ready applications, and accelerate enterprise AI adoption.

This is an opportunity to work on greenfield AI initiatives, influence how AI is deployed across the enterprise, and help define the future of agentic AI, intelligent automation, and AI-powered applications at scale. The ideal candidate thrives in ambiguity, enjoys working directly with business stakeholders, and can rapidly translate business challenges into scalable AI-powered solutions.

Responsibilities

• Partner directly with business stakeholders to understand challenges and identify opportunities for AI-driven transformation.
• Translate ambiguous business requirements into scalable technical architectures and production-ready solutions.
• Design, develop, and deploy AI-powered applications, agents, copilots, and intelligent automation workflows.
• Build production-grade solutions leveraging LLMs, AI agents, MCPs (Model Context Protocol), skills, tools, harnesses, and modern AI frameworks.
• Rapidly prototype and iterate on solutions to validate business value and gather stakeholder feedback.
• Evaluate multiple technical approaches and determine the most effective implementation strategy for a given business problem.
• Develop integrations with enterprise systems, APIs, databases, and business applications.
• Conduct solution demonstrations and communicate technical concepts to both technical and non-technical audiences.
• Collaborate closely with product, engineering, and business teams to drive adoption and measurable outcomes.
• Help establish standards and best practices for enterprise AI development, delivery, evaluation, and governance.

Must Haves

• 5+ years of software engineering, application development, or product engineering experience.
• Strong experience building and shipping production software using technologies such as Python, Java, Go, TypeScript, C#, or similar languages.
• Hands-on experience building and deploying AI applications in production environments.
• Demonstrated product mindset with the ability to balance technical excellence, stakeholder needs, and business impact.
• Experience developing AI agents from scratch and integrating them with tools, APIs, enterprise systems, and external services.
• Strong understanding of LLMs, agent architectures, prompt engineering, context engineering, and modern AI application design.
• Experience with agent orchestration, MCP (Model Context Protocol), skills, tools, harnesses, agent frameworks, or similar AI ecosystems.
• Strong system design, software architecture, and technical problem-solving capabilities.
• Demonstrated ability to decompose ambiguous business challenges into scalable technical solutions.
• Experience working directly with product teams, customers, or business stakeholders.
• Excellent communication, presentation, and stakeholder management skills.
• Demonstrated success working in fast-paced, ambiguous environments where priorities evolve quickly.

Nice To Haves

• Experience building multi-agent systems and complex agent orchestration workflows.
• Experience with RAG architectures, GraphRAG, vector databases, and retrieval systems.
• Experience building coding agents, AI developer tools, AI copilots, or AI-assisted software development solutions.
• Background in workflow orchestration, intelligent automation, or enterprise AI delivery.
• Experience monitoring, evaluating, and improving agent performance in production environments.
• Cloud experience with AWS, Azure, or GCP.
• Experience delivering customer-facing or business-facing AI applications.
• Background in consulting, solution engineering, forward deployed engineering, technical leadership, or customer-facing engineering roles.
• Experience working in highly regulated or enterprise-scale environments such as financial services, healthcare, government, or large technology organizations.
• Experience building observability, evaluation, benchmarking, or governance frameworks around AI solutions.

Ideal Candidate

We're looking for an engineer who combines strong software engineering fundamentals with modern AI development expertise.

Successful candidates are equally comfortable discussing business challenges with stakeholders, architecting solutions, and building production-quality AI applications.

The strongest candidates have experience building AI-powered products rather than simply experimenting with models. They understand how to move from prototype to production, develop robust agentic workflows, integrate AI into existing systems, and deliver measurable business value.

Ideal Backgrounds May Include

• Forward Deployed Engineer
• AI Engineer
• GenAI Engineer
• Software Engineer with AI experience
• Backend Engineer building AI products
• Product Engineer
• Solutions Engineer
• Technical Consultant with hands-on development experience

What Success Looks Like

• Transforms vague business requests into production-ready AI solutions.
• Rapidly delivers prototypes that demonstrate clear business value.
• Builds scalable AI applications that improve efficiency, accuracy, and operational outcomes.
• Drives adoption of AI-powered tools and applications across business teams.
• Demonstrates strong product thinking and customer empathy.
• Balances rapid experimentation with sound engineering and software development practices.
• Serves as a trusted technical advisor to both business and technology stakeholders.
• Helps shape best practices for enterprise AI adoption and implementation.

Top Must Have Skills

• Production AI Agent Development (LLMs, Agents, Agent Orchestration, MCP, Skills, Tools, Harnesses)
• Application Development / Software Engineering Background (Python, Java, Go, TypeScript, C#, or similar technologies)
• Business Problem Decomposition & Stakeholder Engagement (Ability to work directly with business partners, navigate ambiguity, and translate requirements into scalable technical solutions)

NOTE: This listing is for an existing vacancy

Job Type & Location

This is a Contract position based out of Sunnyvale, CA.

Pay And Benefits

The pay range for this position is $80.00 - $85.00/hr.

Individual compensation offered for this position within this range will depend on many factors, including qualifications, skills, relevant experience, job knowledge, geographic location, internal equity, and other pertinent job-related factors.

Eligibility requirements apply to some benefits and may depend on your job classification and length of employment. Benefits are subject to change and may be subject to specific elections, plan, or program terms. If eligible, the benefits available for this temporary role may include the following:

• Medical, dental & vision
• Critical Illness, Accident, and Hospital
• 401(k) Retirement Plan – Pre‑tax and Roth post‑tax contributions available
• Life Insurance (Voluntary Life & AD&DD for the employee and dependents)
• Short and long-term disability
• Health Spending Account (HSA)
• Transportation benefits
• Employee Assistance Program
• Time Off/Leave (PTO, Vacation or Sick Leave) Workplace Type This is a hybrid position in Sunnyvale,CA. Application Deadline This position is anticipated to close on Sep 16, 2026.

About TEKsystems

We're partners in transformation. We help clients activate ideas and solutions to take advantage of a new world of opportunity. We are a team of 80,000 strong, working with over 6,000 clients, including 80% of the Fortune 500, across North America, Europe and Asia. As an industry leader in Full-Stack Technology Services, Talent Services, and real-world application, we work with progressive leaders to drive change. That's the power of true partnership. TEKsystems is an Allegis Group company.

The company is an equal opportunity employer and will consider all applications without regards to race, sex, age, color, religion, national origin, veteran status, disability, sexual orientation, gender identity, genetic information or any characteristic protected by law.

The company is an equal opportunity employer and will consider all applications without regard to race, sex, age, color, religion, national origin, veteran status, disability, sexual orientation, gender identity, genetic information or any characteristic protected by law.

About TEKsystems And TEKsystems Global Services

We’re a leading provider of business and technology services. We accelerate business transformation for our customers. Our expertise in strategy, design, execution and operations unlocks business value through a range of solutions. We’re a team of 80,000 strong, working with over 6,000 customers, including 80% of the Fortune 500 across North America, Europe and Asia, who partner with us for our scale, full-stack capabilities and speed. We’re strategic thinkers, hands-on collaborators, helping customers capitalize on change and master the momentum of technology. We’re building tomorrow by delivering business outcomes and making positive impacts in our global communities. TEKsystems and TEKsystems Global Services are Allegis Group companies. Learn more at TEKsystems.com.

The company is an equal opportunity employer and will consider all applications without regard to race, sex, age, color, religion, national origin, veteran status, disability, sexual orientation, gender identity, genetic information or any characteristic protected by law.

San Francisco Fair Chance Ordinance: Pursuant to the San Francisco Fair Chance Ordinance, for all positions located in the city and county of San Francisco, we will consider for employment qualified applicants with arrest and conviction records.

Massachusetts Lie Detector: It is unlawful in Massachusetts to require or administer a lie detector test as a condition of employment or continued employment. An employer who violates this law shall be subject to criminal penalties and civil liability.

Use of Artificial Intelligence (AI): We may use Artificial Intelligence (AI) to support parts of our hiring process, including sourcing, screening, and evaluating candidates. AI helps assess applications and qualifications, but final decisions are made by our hiring team. By applying, you acknowledge and agree that your application may be reviewed using AI tools.