AI Operations Engineer Technology & Data · Cape Town ·

Collinson Group; Cape Town; On-site; ZAR 1,100,000 - 1,700,000; Full time

Job summary

Collinson Group seeks an AI Ops Engineer to operationalise AI-powered workflows, applications and agents across the organisation, ensuring reliable deployment, secure configuration and day-to-day support for platforms such as Microsoft Entra, Salesforce, Mindflow and Claude.

You will focus on deployment, identity & access management, agent orchestration, governance and cross-functional collaboration to keep AI tooling safe, scalable and production-ready.

Qualifications

• Lead the operational management of AI-powered workflows, applications and agents across the organisation; establish clear ownership, standards and ways of working.
• Coordinate deployment of AI applications, agents and integrations across environments; ensure consistent, repeatable and well-documented setup processes.
• Ensure the AWS, Azure and related cloud environments that support AI workflows, applications and agents are correctly configured, secure, observable and operationally ready across development, test and production environments.
• Manage environment-specific configuration, secrets, credentials and dependency mapping to ensure AI agents and workflows can be deployed, changed and supported consistently across multiple environments.
• Improve repeatability and control of AI operations through infrastructure-as-code, automated configuration, deployment controls and rollback mechanisms; reduce manual setup and operational risk.
• Oversee setup and governance of credentials, permissions and access controls using platforms such as Microsoft Entra and Salesforce; ensure secure and appropriate access to AI tools and workflows.
• Manage the lifecycle of AI agents and automations, including configuration, updates, version control and decommissioning; ensure agents operate reliably within defined parameters.
• Maintain and govern integrations between AI tools and enterprise platforms (e.g. Salesforce, Mindflow, internal systems); ensure stability, security and performance of connections.
• Own support processes for AI workflows and tools; manage incidents, troubleshoot issues, and coordinate resolution across technical teams and vendors.
• Diagnose and coordinate resolution of issues spanning cloud infrastructure, identity platforms, SaaS applications, APIs, workflow tooling and agent orchestration layers.
• Track system usage, access patterns, workflow execution and operational health; identify anomalies, inefficiencies or risks and take corrective action.
• Ensure adherence to organisational policies around security, data protection, access control and responsible use of AI tools; embed governance into operational processes.
• Develop and maintain clear operational playbooks, runbooks and documentation for deployment, support, troubleshooting and access management.
• Develop and maintain runbooks, recovery procedures and operational standards covering deployment failure, degraded integrations, access issues, alert response and service restoration.
• Work closely with Technology, Security, Product and Business teams to align on requirements, prioritisation and operational standards for AI workflows.
• Manage relationships with AI platform providers (e.g. Microsoft, Salesforce, Anthropic, Mindflow); coordinate support, escalations and feature adoption.
• Identify opportunities to improve reliability, usability, security and efficiency of AI operations; evolve processes and tooling as adoption grows.

Skills

AI Ops Leadership

Deployment Mgmt

Cloud Readiness

Env Config Control

IaC & Release Safety

Identity & Access Mgmt

Agent & Workflow Mgmt

Integration & Platform Ops

Support & Issue Resolution

Cross-Layer Troubleshooting

Monitoring & Usage

Governance & Compliance

Playbooks & Documentation

Resilience & Recovery

Cross-Functional Collab

Vendor & Tool Mgmt

Continuous Improvement

Job description

Purpose of the job

As an AI Ops Engineer, you play a central leadership role in operationalising AI-powered workflows, applications and agents across the organisation. Your purpose is to ensure that AI capabilities—delivered through platforms such as Microsoft Entra, Salesforce, Mindflow and Claude—are reliably deployed, securely configured and effectively supported in day-to-day business operations.

You are not responsible for building AI models or developing core algorithms. Instead, you are accountable for the operational layer that enables AI to function within real-world workflows: application deployment, identity and access configuration, credential management, agent orchestration, integration governance and user support.

You contribute hands‑on to prototyping, scripting and operational automation where needed to establish reliable patterns for AI deployment and support.

You create the conditions for AI-powered tools and automations to run safely, consistently and at scale. This includes ensuring that environments are correctly configured, access is controlled, integrations are stable, and operational processes are well-defined and repeatable.

You lead the operational rhythms around AI systems, establishing clear standards for deployment, access control, support and lifecycle management. You ensure that AI workflows are production‑ready, compliant with organisational policies, and aligned with business needs.

A key part of your role is translating AI initiatives into operational reality—co‑ordinating the rollout of AI applications and agents, managing dependencies across systems, and maintaining visibility over usage, issues and risks. You ensure that problems are identified quickly, resolved effectively and used as inputs for continuous improvement.

You act as the integrator across Technology, Security, Product and Business teams—bringing clarity to how AI tools are configured, accessed and supported. You provide visibility into operational risks, access patterns, system dependencies and areas of friction.

Ultimately, your purpose is to build a robust, scalable AI operations capability that ensures AI workflows and tools are dependable, secure and easy to use—enabling the organisation to confidently embed AI into everyday business processes.

Knowledge, skills and experience required

• AI Workflow Operations Leadership Lead the operational management of AI-powered workflows, applications and agents across the organisation; establish clear ownership, standards and ways of working.
• Deployment and Configuration Management Coordinate deployment of AI applications, agents and integrations across environments; ensure consistent, repeatable and well‑documented setup processes.
• Cloud Environment Readiness & Reliability Ensure the AWS, Azure and related cloud environments that support AI workflows, applications and agents are correctly configured, secure, observable and operationally ready across development, test and production environments.
• Environment & Configuration Control Manage environment‑specific configuration, secrets, credentials and dependency mapping to ensure AI agents and workflows can be deployed, changed and supported consistently across multiple environments.
• Infrastructure Automation & Release Safety Improve repeatability and control of AI operations through infrastructure‑as‑code, automated configuration, deployment controls and rollback mechanisms; reduce manual setup and operational risk.
• Identity & Access Management Oversee setup and governance of credentials, permissions and access controls using platforms such as Microsoft Entra and Salesforce; ensure secure and appropriate access to AI tools and workflows.
• Agent & Workflow Management Manage the lifecycle of AI agents and automations, including configuration, updates, version control and decommissioning; ensure agents operate reliably within defined parameters.
• Integration & Platform Operations Maintain and govern integrations between AI tools and enterprise platforms (e.g. Salesforce, Mindflow, internal systems); ensure stability, security and performance of connections.
• Operational Support & Issue Resolution Own support processes for AI workflows and tools; manage incidents, troubleshoot issues, and coordinate resolution across technical teams and vendors.
• Cross‑Layer Troubleshooting Diagnose and coordinate resolution of issues spanning cloud infrastructure, identity platforms, SaaS applications, APIs, workflow tooling and agent orchestration layers.
• Monitoring & Usage Oversight Track system usage, access patterns, workflow execution and operational health; identify anomalies, inefficiencies or risks and take corrective action.
• Governance & Compliance Ensure adherence to organisational policies around security, data protection, access control and responsible use of AI tools; embed governance into operational processes.
• Operational Playbooks & Documentation Develop and maintain clear operational playbooks, runbooks and documentation for deployment, support, troubleshooting and access management.
• Operational Resilience & Recovery Readiness Develop and maintain runbooks, recovery procedures and operational standards covering deployment failure, degraded integrations, access issues, alert response and service restoration.
• Cross‑Functional Collaboration Work closely with Technology, Security, Product and Business teams to align on requirements, prioritisation and operational standards for AI workflows.
• Vendor & Tool Management Manage relationships with AI platform providers (e.g. Microsoft, Salesforce, Anthropic, Mindflow); coordinate support, escalations and feature adoption.
• Continuous Improvement Identify opportunities to improve reliability, usability, security and efficiency of AI operations; evolve processes and tooling as adoption grows.

Collinson is an equal opportunity employer and welcomes differences in all their forms including: colour, race, ethnicity, gender identity, sexual orientation, neurodivergence, family status, age, individuals with disabilities and people from all backgrounds, cultures and experiences as we strongly believe this contributes to our on‑going success.

We are focused on continually evolving our purpose driven, high performing culture, providing an environment where our people have the opportunity to achieve their full potential and do interesting and meaningful work. Our company values are: Take Action, Do the right thing, One team and Be insight led. These help guide everything we do internally in terms of how we think, act and interact, right through to how we deliver value to our customers and clients.

In your application, please feel free to note which pronouns you use (For Example - she/her/hers, he/him/his, they/them/theirs, etc).