Senior Data Engineer (Hybrid)

American Family Insurance; Alabama; Hybrid; USD 99,000 - 167,000; Full time

Job summary

American Family Insurance is seeking a Senior Data Engineer to guide the AI Platform team and oversee a group of engineers advancing our data and AI platform.

You will report to a Senior Manager, Data Engineering, in a flex office/home role with a Madison, WI base. The role emphasizes platform reliability, scalable AI, and collaboration across disciplines.

Qualifications

• Deep software engineering fundamentals with large codebases and enterprise SDLC.
• Hands-on experience with LLMs in production: RAG, agents, evaluation, or fine-tuning.
• Strong system design skills focused on scalability, failure modes, and maintainability.
• Expert-level Python programming in a software engineering context.
• Experience designing and building APIs for internal or external use.
• Experience with infrastructure-as-code tools (Terraform, Docker) and CI/CD pipelines.

Responsibilities

• Partner with business and technology leaders to translate needs into scalable AI solutions.
• Architect and build enterprise AI platform capabilities for deployment, evaluation, observability, and tooling.
• Establish reusable patterns and shared services including LLM infrastructure and CI/CD.
• Drive technical excellence across AI products and platforms, setting standards for architecture, testing, and security.
• Evaluate and modernize existing AI/ML solutions for performance and value.
• Collaborate across teams to ensure successful delivery of platform capabilities and AI-enabled outcomes.
• Champion platform reliability, observability, and operational readiness.
• Create and maintain technical documentation, standards and best practices.

Skills

Python

LLMs in production

System design

GCP Vertex AI

Pub/Sub

BigQuery

NoSQL (Firestore/Bigtable)

Kubernetes

APIs

Infrastructure as code

Tools

Kubernetes

Terraform

Docker

Vertex AI

Job description

American Family Insurance looking for an experienced and driven Senior Data Engineer to guide our AI Platform team. In this important role, you will oversee a team of engineers in advancing our service‑oriented data and AI platform. The Data and AI Platform team influences multiple departments, including security and AI, at AmFam. You will create tools and infrastructure that empower other teams and departments within American Family Insurance.

You will report to a Senior Manager, Data Engineering.

In this flex office/home role, you will be expected to work a minimum of 10 days per month from the following office location: Madison, WI 53783.

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Position Compensation Range:

$99,000.00 - $167,000.00

Pay Rate Type:

Salary

Compensation may vary based on the job level and your geographic work location. Relocation support is offered for eligible candidates.

Primary Accountabilities

• Partner with business and technology leaders to turn complex, ambiguous opportunities into scalable AI solutions, translating evolving business needs into clear technical approaches and measurable outcomes.
• Architect and build enterprise AI platform capabilities that accelerate adoption across teams, including model deployment, evaluation frameworks, observability, feature management, and operational tooling.
• Establish reusable engineering patterns and shared services that improve speed, consistency, and scalability, including LLM infrastructure, internal developer tools, automation frameworks, and CI/CD practices.
• Drive technical excellence across AI products and platforms by defining standards for architecture, code quality, testing, deployment, security, and operational reliability.
• Evaluate and modernize existing AI and machine learning solutions, identifying opportunities to improve performance, scalability, maintainability, and business value.
• Collaborate across engineering, architecture, product, and business teams to align priorities, remove barriers, and ensure successful delivery of platform capabilities and AI‑enabled outcomes.
• Champion platform reliability, observability, and operational readiness, ensuring solutions are measurable, supportable, and designed for long‑term adoption and growth.
• Create and maintain clear technical documentation, standards, and best practices, enabling teams to efficiently leverage platform capabilities while ensuring consistency and governance across the AI ecosystem.

Specialized Knowledge & Skills Requirements

• Deep software engineering fundamentals: experience with large codebases, design patterns, testability, and enterprise SDLC.
• Hands‑on experience with LLMs in production: RAG, agents, evaluation, prompt engineering, or fine‑tuning.
• Strong system design skills with an emphasis on scalability, failure modes, and long‑term maintainability.
• Deep experience with GCP, specifically Vertex AI, Pub/Sub, BigQuery, and NoSQL databases (e.g., Firestore, Bigtable).
• Applied knowledge of Kubernetes for container orchestration and workload management.
• Demonstrated experience building AI/ML systems that run in production at scale - not notebooks or prototypes, but real software serving real users.
• Proven ability to take ambiguous, undefined problems and deliver shipped products.
• Expert‑level Python programming in a software engineering context, not just scripting or pipelines.
• Experience designing and building APIs for internal or external consumption.
• Experience with infrastructure‑as‑code tools (e.g., Terraform, Docker) and CI/CD pipelines.

Travel Requirements

• Up to 10%.

Additional Information

• To ensure a strong start, all employees participate in our New Employee Orientation during their first week. This experience is held in person at our Madison, WI Headquarters or one of our AmFam core locations to help you connect with our mission, meet key team members and build relationships that support your growth. At times, sessions may be delivered virtually based on scheduling and availability.
• Offer to selected candidate will be made contingent on the results of applicable background checks
• Offer to selected candidate is contingent on signing a non‑disclosure agreement for proprietary information, trade secrets, and inventions
• Sponsorship will not be considered for this position unless specified in the posting

We provide benefits that support your physical, emotional, and financial wellbeing. You will have access to comprehensive medical, dental, vision and wellbeing benefits that enable you to take care of your health. We also offer a competitive 401(k) contribution, a pension plan, an annual incentive, 9 paid holidays and a paid time off program (23 days accrued annually for full‑time employees). In addition, our student loan repayment program and paid‑family leave are available to support our employees and their families. Interns and contingent workers are not eligible for American Family Insurance Group benefits.

We are an equal opportunity employer. It is our policy to comply with all applicable federal, state and local laws pertaining to non‑discrimination, non‑harassment and equal opportunity. We also consider qualified applicants with criminal histories, consistent with applicable federal, state and local law.

American Family Insurance is committed to the full inclusion of all qualified individuals. If a reasonable accommodation is needed to participate in the job application or interview process, to perform essential job functions, and/or to receive other benefits and privileges of employment, please email [e-mail] to request a reasonable accommodation.

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