AI Product Engineering Lead Role

Network Finance; South Africa; On-site; ZAR 1,200,000 - 1,800,000; Full time

Job summary

Network Finance seeks an AI Product Engineering Lead to drive the next growth phase by delivering dependable intelligence that improves user outcomes and productivity.

The role is hands-on and strategic, coding and validating solutions while guiding product direction for AI capabilities across Azure-based .NET services. You will mentor engineers, shape standards, and collaborate with stakeholders to scale a live platform.

Qualifications

• Strong commercial experience with C# and .NET (ASP.NET Core).
• Proven experience building and deploying AI-powered applications in production environments.
• Hands-on experience with Azure OpenAI, Azure AI Foundry, and Microsoft AI SDKs.
• Experience with tool and function calling and agent-based architectures.
• Knowledge of MCP (Model Context Protocol).
• Experience evaluating and improving AI systems for reliability and performance.

Responsibilities

• Define and drive the AI vision and roadmap alongside Product Owners.
• Deliver AI capabilities from concept through deployment and adoption.
• Ensure AI capabilities integrate with automation, knowledge access, and learning systems.
• Establish best practices and patterns to raise AI capability across the engineering team.
• Design intelligent experiences to improve operational outcomes and decision-making.

Skills

C# & .NET

AI in production

Azure OpenAI

Azure AI Foundry

Microsoft AI SDKs

Tool calling

Agent-based architectures

MCP (Model Context Protocol)

Data governance

Tools

Azure OpenAI Services

ASP.NET Core

Agent frameworks

Event-driven architectures

Job description

About the opportunity

The platform is already live and being used by customers. As the product continues to scale, the AI Product Engineering Lead will be responsible for driving the next phase of growth by developing dependable intelligence that helps users:

• Execute work more effectively
• Manage operational processes
• Design and optimise workflows
• Access organisational knowledge at scale
• Improve decision-making and productivity

This is a hands‑on leadership role. You'll remain close to the technology, writing code, validating solutions, diagnosing AI behaviour, and delivering production-ready improvements while providing strategic direction for the product's AI capabilities.

Key responsibilities

AI Product Ownership

• Define and drive the product's AI vision and roadmap alongside Product Owners.
• Take accountability for delivering AI capabilities from concept through deployment and adoption.
• Ensure assistance, automation, organisational knowledge, and learning capabilities work together to achieve meaningful product outcomes.
• Establish best practices, standards, and patterns that raise the AI capability of the wider engineering team.

Business Process & Product Thinking

• Understand how organisations operate and identify opportunities where AI can create measurable value.
• Design intelligent experiences that improve operational outcomes rather than simply adding AI features.
• Work directly with stakeholders to understand decision-making, accountability, exceptions, and business processes.
• Determine when AI should assist, automate, or remain in the background.

Applied AI Engineering

• Analyse and improve AI performance by identifying issues relating to context, data, tooling, prompts, or process design.
• Build, test, and deploy enhancements within Azure-based .NET services.
• Own quality, evaluation, testing, behavioural controls, and continuous improvement processes.
• Implement solutions using Microsoft AI technologies, Azure AI services, and modern agent frameworks.

Knowledge & Learning Systems

• Enable secure and scalable access to organisational knowledge, policies, procedures, decisions, and operational history.
• Develop approaches that retrieve relevant experience, analyse outcomes, incorporate expert feedback, and drive continuous improvement.
• Evaluate when retrieval, product design, or model training is the most effective solution.

What We're Looking For

Essential Experience

• Strong commercial experience with C# and .NET (ASP.NET Core).
• Proven experience building and deploying AI-powered applications in production environments.
• Hands-on experience with:
• Azure OpenAI
• Azure AI Foundry
• Microsoft AI SDKs
• Tool and function calling
• Agent-based architectures
• Model Context Protocol (MCP)
• Experience evaluating, testing, and improving AI systems for reliability and performance.
• Strong understanding of data, knowledge management, governance, and permissions models.

Technical Expertise

• Experience designing intelligent, production-grade AI solutions rather than proof‑of‑concept demonstrations.
• Knowledge of multi‑agent or agent‑to‑agent architectures.
• Experience implementing governed and secure tool access patterns.
• Familiarity with event‑driven architectures and messaging platforms.
• Comfortable working within API‑first product environments.

Leadership & Product Skills

• Ability to connect technical decisions with product outcomes and customer value.
• Experience partnering closely with Product Owners and cross‑functional teams.
• Strong decision‑making skills with ownership of end‑to‑end delivery.
• Ability to mentor, review, and elevate engineering standards across a growing team.

Personal Attributes

• Hands‑on and delivery-focused.
• Strong communicator capable of explaining AI concepts to technical and non‑technical audiences.
• Commercially minded with excellent problem‑solving skills.
• Comfortable working in a fast‑paced, scaling product environment.
• Passionate about emerging AI technologies while maintaining a practical, outcome‑driven approach.

Why Join?

• Take ownership of AI strategy within a live and growing product.
• Work at the forefront of Microsoft's AI ecosystem.
• Influence product direction and technical standards.
• Collaborate with a talented, ambitious team.
• Make a direct impact on how organisations use AI to improve work and operations.
• Enjoy the opportunity to shape a product at a pivotal stage of growth.

*ONLY South African ID holders who are currently located in South Africa will be considered.