Senior NLP Engineer - Dialogue Systems

Placements24; Polokwane; Hybrid; ZAR 1,200,000 - 1,800,000; Full time

Benefits offered by this job

Competitive salary

Remote-friendly work

Health insurance

Generous time off

Professional development

Travel opportunities

Home office stipend

Job summary

Placements24 in Polokwane seeks a Senior NLP Engineer to design, build, and refine NLP models for dialogue management, intent recognition, and response generation. You will work with large-scale datasets and cutting-edge techniques to advance our conversational AI platform.

The role offers remote work flexibility, collaboration with a world-class team, and opportunities to contribute to research and production systems while focusing on responsible AI and bias mitigation.

Qualifications

• Master's or Ph.D. in CS, Computational Linguistics, AI, or a related field with NLP focus.
• Minimum of 4 years of NLP experience, specializing in dialogue systems or conversational AI.
• Strong programming in Python and NLP libraries (spaCy, NLTK, Hugging Face Transformers).
• Proficiency with deep learning frameworks (TensorFlow or PyTorch).
• Experience deploying intent recognition and dialogue management systems.
• Knowledge of language modeling, text generation, and speech processing fundamentals.
• Experience with large datasets and cloud-based ML platforms.
• Excellent analytical, problem-solving, and communication skills.
• Ability to work effectively in a remote team.
• Familiarity with MLOps and LLMS applications in dialogue is a plus.

Responsibilities

• Develop and implement state-of-the-art Natural Language Processing (NLP) models for dialogue systems.
• Design and build robust intent recognition, entity extraction, and dialogue state tracking components.
• Create and optimize natural language generation (NLG) modules for fluent and contextually relevant responses.
• Work with large text and speech datasets, applying techniques for data preprocessing and augmentation.
• Conduct rigorous experimentation and evaluation of NLP models using appropriate metrics.
• Collaborate with software engineers to integrate NLP components into production systems.
• Stay abreast of the latest research and advancements in NLP, conversational AI, and dialogue systems.
• Contribute to the architectural design and technical roadmap of our NLP capabilities.
• Troubleshoot and improve the performance of existing NLP models and pipelines.
• Mentor junior NLP engineers and share knowledge within the team.
• Ensure responsible AI practices, focusing on fairness and bias mitigation in language models.

Skills

Python

NLP Libraries

Deep Learning

LLMs in dialogue

MLOps

Remote collaboration

Research publications

Education

Master's or Ph.D. in CS/Computational Linguistics/AI with NLP focus

Tools

SpaCy

NLTK

Hugging Face Transformers

TensorFlow

PyTorch

Job description

About the Role

Our client is a leader in conversational AI, developing cutting-edge dialogue systems and virtual assistants. We are seeking a highly skilled Senior NLP Engineer to join our advanced research and development team. This role focuses on designing, building, and refining natural language processing models and algorithms specifically for complex dialogue management, intent recognition, and response generation. You will work with large-scale datasets, cutting-edge NLP techniques, and contribute to the core intelligence of our products. This position offers the flexibility of remote work, enabling you to collaborate with a world-class team from anywhere. Join us in shaping the future of human-computer interaction in Polokwane and beyond.

Key Responsibilities

• Develop and implement state-of-the-art Natural Language Processing (NLP) models for dialogue systems.
• Design and build robust intent recognition, entity extraction, and dialogue state tracking components.
• Create and optimize natural language generation (NLG) modules for fluent and contextually relevant responses.
• Work with large text and speech datasets, applying techniques for data preprocessing and augmentation.
• Conduct rigorous experimentation and evaluation of NLP models using appropriate metrics.
• Collaborate with software engineers to integrate NLP components into production systems.
• Stay abreast of the latest research and advancements in NLP, conversational AI, and dialogue systems.
• Contribute to the architectural design and technical roadmap of our NLP capabilities.
• Troubleshoot and improve the performance of existing NLP models and pipelines.
• Mentor junior NLP engineers and share knowledge within the team.
• Ensure responsible AI practices, focusing on fairness and bias mitigation in language models.

Requirements

• Master's or Ph.D. in Computer Science, Computational Linguistics, Artificial Intelligence, or a related field with a focus on NLP.
• Minimum of 4 years of experience in Natural Language Processing, with a specialization in dialogue systems or conversational AI.
• Strong programming skills in Python and experience with NLP libraries (e.g., spaCy, NLTK, Hugging Face Transformers).
• Proficiency with deep learning frameworks such as TensorFlow or PyTorch.
• Hands-on experience with building and deploying intent recognition and dialogue management systems.
• Solid understanding of language modeling, text generation, and speech processing fundamentals.
• Experience working with large datasets and cloud-based ML platforms.
• Excellent analytical and problem-solving abilities.
• Strong communication and collaboration skills, with the ability to work effectively in a remote team environment.
• Familiarity with machine learning operations (MLOps) is a plus.
• Experience with large language models (LLMs) and their applications in dialogue is highly desirable.
• Published research in NLP or AI conferences is an advantage.

Benefits

• Competitive salary package reflecting expertise and experience.
• Flexible remote work arrangement with potential for travel to team hubs.
• Comprehensive health, dental, and vision insurance.
• Generous paid time off and company holidays.
• Opportunities for professional development, including attending conferences and pursuing advanced training.
• Chance to work on impactful projects at the forefront of conversational AI technology.
• Collaborative and innovative team culture, accessible remotely.
• Retirement savings plan with company contributions.
• Home office stipend and equipment allowance.
• Regular virtual team-building activities and social events.