Principal Designer (R5250)

Job Description

Job Description

Founded in 2015, Shield AI is a venture-backed defense-tech company with the mission of protecting service members and civilians with intelligent systems. Its products include Hivemind autonomy software and V-BAT and X-BAT aircraft. With offices and facilities across the U.S., Europe, the Middle East, and Asia-Pacific, Shield AI’s technology actively supports operations worldwide. For more information, visit Follow Shield AI on LinkedIn, X, Instagram, and YouTube. 

The Special Projects team at Shield AI is an elite force within the office of the CTO. It consists of a group of very senior (L5-L8) and highly experienced software engineering experts from diverse fields (aerospace, robotics, cloud infrastructure, game development, interactive media design, ...). The charter of this group is to steer technology development towards strategic alignment with the CTO's vision, through tactical insertion into teams and technologies across the organization. Individuals within this team make direct and at times forward-sprinting contributions to all three pillars of Hivemind, Shield AI's software ecosystem for developing and deploying resilient intelligent teaming for aircrafts. Hivemind consists of four products: EdgeOS (C++ based high-performance middleware for autonomy development), Pilot (autonomy for the edge built atop EdgeOS; a models-based, modular and open architecture C++ codebase), Forge (Shield AI's AI Factory for the design, development, and testing of Hivemind Edge systems; a service-oriented architecture leveraged through an SDK, CLI, and web portal; a Go, Python, Typescript codebase), Commander (Software and hardware to support rich human-in-the-loop and human-on-the-loop interactions with the Hivemind; a C++-based back-end for interaction with Pilot; and a web-application UI for mission planning, command and control by operators implemented in a Typescript/React codebase).

The Special Projects team is chartered to operate effectively within ambiguity. While this team does not own any software products, it tactically and strategically impacts the development of all foundational Hivemind products and leverages those technologies to rapidly deliver low-TRL solutions. This work happens shoulder-to-shoulder with the product teams in some cases, and in a forward-sprinting manner within the Special Projects team in other cases. The result is direct contribution to products in the former case, and development of reference implementations in the latter. The Special Projects team also functions as a pipeline for product and solution engineering teams across the organization. Individuals who enter the Special Projects team rapidly gain depth and breadth in their understanding of the Hivemind software ecosystem. This positions them well for leading technology development effort across the product and solution organization.

• Design and build the user experience for agentic AI products across the office of the CTO: an enterprise knowledge assistant (Brain), an agent-driven engineering platform (Springboard), and enterprise AI/data applications.
• Prototype in code. Ship working React/TypeScript implementations, not mockups — then land them in production with the product teams.
• Design the core interaction patterns of agentic software: streaming responses, citations and provenance, multi-modal input, artifact sharing, and human-in-the-loop review and approval surfaces.
• Design interfaces for foundation-model based autonomy architectures and model lifecycle tooling: evaluation dashboards, trace inspection, observability, and verification surfaces.
• Conduct user research across engineers, operators, and executives; define personae and translate findings into design decisions.
• Investigate competing agentic and enterprise AI products; synthesize findings for engineering and product leadership.
• Establish reusable design patterns and a component vocabulary for AI applications across the organization.
• Drive adoption: instrument what you ship, watch real usage, and iterate daily.

• 12+ years designing and building production software interfaces, with end-to-end ownership from research through shipped product.
• Expert-level React/TypeScript; you write production-quality front-end code, not just prototypes.
• Portfolio of shipped tools or applications demonstrating strong interaction design and visual craft.
• Hands-on experience designing LLM-powered experiences: streaming, progressive rendering, loading states, context and conversation management.
• Deep knowledge of client and UI state management, the DOM, browser APIs, WebSockets, and Server-Sent Events.
• Experience running user research and usability testing, and acting on the results.
• Strong software hygiene: Git, code review, testing, CI/CD.
• Fluid intelligence that allows one to operate effectively in ambiguous conditions while finding opportunities to drive technical efforts and force multiply.
• Experience with Linux, Docker, and a major cloud platform (Azure, GCP, AWS).
• This role requires travel to a Shield AI location 1-3 times per quarter

• Experience designing developer tools, IDEs, or engineering workflow products.
• Data visualization experience (D3, WebGL, dashboards); geospatial a plus.
• Experience building or maintaining a design system.
• Experience designing debugging/inspection UIs for generative AI systems.
• Experience with Electron (or similar).
• Experience with user experience design for video games or interactive media.
• Experience designing for "low code" or "no code" systems.
• Comfort reading C++ and/or Python and/or Go.

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Full-time regular employee offer package:

Pay within range listed + Bonus + Benefits + Equity

Temporary employee offer package:

Pay within range listed above + temporary benefits package (applicable after 60 days of employment)

Salary compensation is influenced by a wide array of factors including but not limited to skill set, level of experience, licenses and certifications, and specific work location. All offers are contingent on a cleared background and possible reference check. Military fellows and part-time employees are not eligible for benefits. Please speak to your talent acquisition representative for more information.

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Shield AI is proud to be an equal opportunity workplace and is an affirmative action employer. We are committed to equal employment opportunity regardless of race, color, ancestry, religion, sex, national origin, sexual orientation, age, marital status, disability, gender identity or Veteran status. If you have a disability or special need that requires accommodation, please let us know. 

We may use artificial intelligence (AI) tools to support parts of the hiring process, such as reviewing applications, analyzing resumes, or assessing responses and identifying potential inconsistencies or verification signals in application materials based on available information. These tools assist our recruitment team but do not replace human judgment. Final hiring decisions are ultimately made by humans. If you would like more information about how your data is processed, please contact us.