Lead Machine Learning Engineer

Lead Machine Learning Engineer

As a Capital One Lead Machine Learning Engineer (MLE), you'll be part of an Agile team dedicated to productionizing Generative AI and advanced agentic systems at scale. You'll lead the detailed technical design, development, and implementation of core agentic architectures and multi-agent workflows using emerging technologies. You'll focus on system-level architectural design, develop and review complex models and application code, and ensure the high availability, performance, and security of our generative AI applications. You'll have the opportunity to continuously learn and apply the latest innovations and best practices in generative and agentic machine learning engineering.

What you'll do in the role:

• Architect Agentic Platforms: Design, develop, and scale core agentic engines and multi-agent workflow solutions, enabling seamless composition of conversational and business automation workflows.
• Drive AI Evaluation & Trust: Build and integrate scalable evaluation (Evals) and observability frameworks into solutions to ensure model predictability, performance monitoring, and mitigation of model risk.
• Deliver High-Impact Use Cases: Partner with cross-functional product and business teams to deploy production AI solutions, including next-generation consumer AI experiences, intelligent recommendation engines, and advanced conversational assistants.
• Enforce Enterprise Guardrails: Ensure all AI/ML applications strictly adhere to robust data privacy standards, regulatory postures, and framework auditability/explainability.
• Translate Practical Research: Stay abreast of practical advancements in LLM optimization, retrieval-augmented generation (RAG), and multi-agent design patterns, judiciously applying these novel techniques to production systems.
• Technical Leadership & Code Excellence: Provide technical direction, architectural oversight, and rigorous code reviews for engineering teams, fostering a culture of modern engineering excellence.

Basic Qualifications:

• Bachelor's Degree
• At least 6 years of experience designing and building data-intensive solutions using distributed computing (Internship experience does not apply)
• At least 4 years of experience programming with Python, Scala, or Java

Preferred Qualifications:

• Master's or doctoral degree in computer science, electrical engineering, mathematics, or a similar field
• 3+ years of experience with GenAI frameworks (e.g., LangChain, LangGraph, LlamaIndex) and Vector Databases
• 3 years of experience building, scaling, and optimizing Large Language Model (LLM) or GenAI orchestration systems in production
• 2+ years of experience building automated evaluations (Evals) and observability pipelines for LLMs
• 3+ years of on-the-job experience with an industry-recognized ML framework such as scikit-learn, PyTorch, Dask, Spark, or TensorFlow
• Experience deploying AI solutions within a strictly regulated environment, incorporating data privacy and model risk governance
• Demonstrated ability to lead technical architecture design and provide deep technical guidance to engineering teams
• Experience developing and deploying ML solutions in a public cloud such as AWS, Azure, or Google Cloud Platform
• ML industry impact through conference presentations, papers, blog posts, open-source contributions, or patents

At this time, Capital One will not sponsor a new applicant for employment authorization, or offer any immigration related support for this position (i.e. H1B, F-1 OPT, F-1 STEM OPT, F-1 CPT, J-1, TN, E-2, E-3, L-1 and O-1, or any EADs or other forms of work authorization that require immigration support from an employer).

The minimum and maximum full-time annual salaries for this role are listed below, by location. Please note that this salary information is solely for candidates hired to perform work within one of these locations, and refers to the amount Capital One is willing to pay at the time of this posting. Salaries for part-time roles will be prorated based upon the agreed upon number of hours to be regularly worked.

Plano, TX: $179,400 - $204,700 for Lead Machine Learning Engineer

Candidates hired to work in other locations will be subject to the pay range associated with that location, and the actual annualized salary amount offered to any candidate at the time of hire will be reflected solely in the candidate's offer letter.

This role is also eligible to earn performance based incentive compensation, which may include cash bonus(es) and/or long term incentives (LTI). Incentives could be discretionary or non discretionary depending on the plan.

Capital One offers a comprehensive, competitive, and inclusive set of health, financial and other benefits that support your total well-being. Learn more at the Capital One Careers website. Eligibility varies based on full or part-time status, exempt or non-exempt status, and management level.

This role is expected to accept applications for a minimum of 5 business days.

No agencies please. Capital One is an equal opportunity employer (EOE, including disability/vet) committed to non-discrimination in compliance with applicable federal, state, and local laws. Capital One promotes a drug-free workplace. Capital One will consider for employment qualified applicants with a criminal history in a manner consistent with the requirements of applicable laws regarding criminal background inquiries, including, to the extent applicable, Article 23-A of the New York Correction Law; San Francisco, California Police Code Article 49, Sections 4901-4920; New York City's Fair Chance Act; Philadelphia's Fair Criminal Records Screening Act; and other applicable federal, state, and local laws and regulations regarding criminal background inquiries.

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Capital One Financial is made up of several different entities. Please note that any position posted in Canada is for Capital One Canada, any position posted in the United Kingdom is for Capital One Europe and any position posted in the Philippines is for Capital One Philippines Service Corp. (COPSSC).