Senior Staff Machine Learning Engineer, (Machine Learning)

Senior Staff Machine Learning Engineer, ML Underwriting Affirm is reinventing credit to make it more honest and friendly, giving consumers the flexibility to buy now and pay later without hidden fees or compounding interest. As a Senior Staff Machine Learning Engineer, you will help shape the future of machine learning at Affirm. You’ll partner with ML Platform, engineering, product, and risk leaders to design, implement, and scale advanced modeling approaches that drive critical decisions across the company. You will mentor senior engineers, bring clarity to complex, ambiguous problems, and contribute to a cohesive long-term ML strategy. What You’ll Do Define and drive multi‑year, multi‑team technical strategy for machine learning across the organization. Lead the design, implementation, and scaling of advanced ML systems, setting architectural direction for cross‑functional initiatives. Partner deeply with ML Platform, product, engineering, and risk leadership to shape long‑term modeling capabilities. Provide broad technical leadership across the ML organization, mentoring senior engineers and elevating design and code quality. Drive clarity and alignment on ambiguous, high‑stakes technical decisions, resolving cross‑team tensions. Champion operational and system excellence, owning long‑term health, availability, and evolution of critical ML systems. What We Look For 10+ years of experience researching, designing, deploying, and operating large‑scale, real‑time machine learning systems; PhD may count for up to 2 YOE. Experience leading end‑to‑end ML system design from data architecture and feature pipelines to model training, evaluation, and production deployment. Proficiency in Python and ML frameworks such as PyTorch and XGBoost; experience with ML tooling for training orchestration, experimentation, and monitoring. Strong understanding of representation learning and embedding‑based modeling, deep expertise in neural network‑based sequence modeling (Transformers, recurrent, attention). Hands‑on experience with large‑scale distributed ML infrastructure: streaming/batch ingestion, feature stores, training pipelines, model serving, monitoring, and automated retraining. Demonstrated technical leadership, strategic planning, and ability to influence cross‑team execution. Exceptional judgment, collaboration, and communication skills; mentorship of senior engineers. Strong verbal and written communication skills for global collaboration. Compensation & Benefits Pay Grade – R Equity Grade – 15 Base Pay (CA, WA, NY, NJ, CT) – $260,000–$310,000 per year Base Pay (All other U.S. states) – $232,000–$282,000 per year Remote‑First – Roles are mostly remote with limited on‑site requirements for specific responsibilities. Benefits Highlights

• Health care coverage – employer covers all premiums for coverage levels and dependents
• Flexible Spending Wallets – stipends for technology, food, lifestyle, and family expenses
• Time off – competitive vacation and holiday schedules
• ESPP – employee stock purchase plan at a discount

Equal Opportunity & Accessibility Affirm is proud to be a remote‑first company that provides an inclusive interview experience for all, including people with disabilities. We will provide reasonable accommodations during the hiring process. Pursuant to the San Francisco Fair Chance Ordinance and Los Angeles Fair Chance Initiative, qualified applicants with arrest and conviction records will be considered for employment. By clicking "Submit Application," you acknowledge that you have read the Global Candidate Privacy Notice and give informed consent to the collection, processing, use, and storage of your personal information. #J-18808-Ljbffr Affirm