Principal AI Engineer

Job Title: Principal AI Systems Architect (Contract Engagement) Role Overview We are seeking a Principal AI Systems Architect for a focused, time-boxed engagement to define the foundational AI architecture for our core product platform. You will embed directly within our engineering team to design, validate, and document the architectural assets and deployment playbooks necessary to transition our current infrastructure into an autonomous, AI-native environment. This is a high-autonomy role for a seasoned AI leader who thrives on "blank slate" architectural design and wants to leave a lasting, high-impact blueprint for an engineering team to execute against. You will not be an outside consultant; you will be a full team member, driving the vision for cloud-to-edge AI deployment and defining how we operationalize GenAI at production scale. Key Responsibilities Architectural Leadership

• AI Reference Architecture: Develop and validate a production-grade AI reference architecture that spans data ingestion, inference, and monitoring across distributed environments.
• Playbook Engineering: Produce "immediately usable" deployment playbooks, decision records, and technical artifacts that provide clear, durable guidance for our engineers.
• System Design: Architect solutions for edge-to-cloud execution, balancing latency, cost, and resiliency. Define the standards for time-series data handling, event-driven integration, and API patterns.

GenAI & MLOps Governance

• GenAI Orchestration: Design production-scale GenAI applications utilizing agentic architectures, multi-agent orchestration, and complex tool-calling patterns.
• MLOps/Observability: Establish robust MLOps foundations, including model versioning, drift detection, observability, and cost-optimization strategies (routing, caching, and model selection).
• RAG & Retrieval: Architect production-scale RAG (Retrieval-Augmented Generation) pipelines, vector database strategies, and embedding models that ensure high-performance, accurate retrieval.

Qualifications & Requirements Minimum Qualifications

• Experience Baseline: 10+ years of software/systems engineering; 6+ years specifically focused on AI/ML in production.
• Systems Architecture: Demonstrated success in designing end-to-end AI systems-from data ingestion through monitoring-at scale.
• GenAI Proficiency: Expert knowledge of production GenAI (LLM providers, vector databases, and observability tools like LangSmith/LangFuse).
• Communication: Ability to produce clear, durable technical artifacts (design records, architectural diagrams) that allow a team to execute a complex vision autonomously.
• Collaboration: Experience working in an "embedded team" model; comfortable facilitating design workshops and providing direct technical feedback.

Preferred Attributes

• Experience operationalizing AI in highly technical or regulated environments (e.g., critical infrastructure, industrial automation, or complex hardware-interfaced systems).
• Proficiency in containerization, CI/CD, and instrumenting AI systems in production.
• Experience implementing AI safety, content filtering, and governance guardrails.

Equal Opportunity Employer / Disabled / Protected Veterans The Know Your Rights poster is available here: The pay transparency policy is available here: For temporary assignments lasting 13 weeks or longer, AllSTEM Connections is pleased to offer major medical, dental, vision, 401k and any statutory sick pay where required. We are committed to working with and providing reasonable accommodations to individuals with disabilities. If you need a reasonable accommodation for any part of the employment process, please contact your staffing representative who will reach out to our HR team. AllSTEM Connections participates in the E-Verify program in certain locations as required by law. Learn more about the E-Verify program. We also consider for employment qualified applicants regardless of criminal histories, consistent with legal requirements, including, if applicable, the City of Los Angeles' Fair Chance Initiative for Hiring Ordinance. Pursuant to applicable state and municipal Fair Chance Laws and Ordinances, we will consider for employment-qualified applicants with arrest and conviction records, including, if applicable, the San Francisco Fair Chance Ordinance. For Los Angeles, CA applicants: Qualified applications with arrest or conviction records will be considered for employment in accordance with the Los Angeles County Fair Chance Ordinance for Employers and the California Fair Chance Act. Additional Skills (none specified) AllSTEM Representative Contact Info Account Executive: Nichols Branch Phone: View phone number on click.appcast.io Location: Ontario, CA AllSTEM Connections