Senior AI Architect/Lead Engineer

ATI builds and manages collaborations that conducts research and development of new technologies to solve our nation's most pressing challenges. Our collaborations are custom-built teams of organizations from industry and academia that develop novel technologies for the federal government. Traditionally, these processes are complicated and burdensome. That's where ATI comes in. We simplify and streamline processes to make it all work. When you work at ATI, you become a part of something larger than yourself. Our collective work - no matter what department or division you work in - ultimately enables the warfighter, saves lives, and diversifies the industrial base. At our core, ATI is a service organization. We are in service to others; it's what we do, and it's who we are.

Position Description:

The Senior AI Architect/Lead Engineer will serve as the organization's senior technical leader for AI, owning the technical direction and architecture across AI tools, applications, models, agents, and data integrations. This person will establish the standards that govern how AI solutions are built and translate strategic priorities into a credible, phased technical roadmap that supports long-term sustainability, maintainability, scalability, and cost management as AI technologies evolve.
This is a hands-on role. As the AI Engineering Lead, this person will prototype and build production solutions, develop shared capabilities, review code, troubleshoot complex issues, and guide engineers in their day-to-day technical work. This person must be as comfortable presenting architecture decisions to non-technical leadership as they are working alongside engineers.
This role works in close partnership with the AI Innovation Lead to align technical delivery with business priorities, adoption, and organizational readiness, with clear responsibilities, handoffs, and an agreed collaboration cadence.

Apply at ATI.ORG; we only accept applications submitted through our applicant tracking system.

**We offer a hybrid schedule (in-office & remote/work from home), fully remote or an onsite schedule and flexible hours. Candidates will need to reside near Charleston, SC to ensure work site flexibility. Fully remote work may be considered for qualified candidates residing outside of Charleston, SC.**

Essential Functions:

AI Architecture & Technical Strategy
Own architectural direction for the AI capability stack on Microsoft Azure, including data flow patterns, integration approach, and selection of appropriate AI services in partnership with technical leadership.

Ensure AI tools, applications, and platforms work together through shared services, reusable components, and consistent integration patterns.

Develop and maintain a phased AI technical roadmap that addresses current delivery needs and long-term evolution, including dependencies, operating costs, technical debt, and flexibility to change models or vendors.

Work with Technical Leadership to make and document build vs. buy decisions, including evaluation of existing vendor relationships and third-party AI capabilities.

Ensure applicable security and compliance requirements, including FedRAMP, are identified early and designed in, engaging internal and vendor resources where deeper expertise is needed.

Establish and maintain practical AI standards covering solution design, development, evaluation, security, deployment, monitoring, documentation, and handoff practices.

Evaluate the AskSage and Copilot deployments and define their roles within the broader AI stack, identifying opportunities for integration, reuse, and consolidation.

Define data architecture patterns appropriate for AI workloads, including retrieval-augmented generation (RAG), document ingestion pipelines, and knowledge retrieval, in partnership with data and security teams.

Evaluate emerging AI technologies and recommend adoption when they offer clear business or technical value.

Delivery & Engineering Leadership
Build working prototypes of prioritized AI capabilities to validate feasibility and demonstrate technical direction, and lead development through production deployment and ongoing operation.

Translate business priorities and architectural designs into actionable engineering tasks, technical requirements, and delivery plans.

Provide day-to-day technical guidance through design reviews, code reviews, troubleshooting, and mentoring, helping engineers resolve blockers and deliver maintainable solutions.

Evaluate the current AI capabilities and recommend a plan to grow capabilities through training or augmentation.

Work with internal and external team members to determine the best delivery strategy and establish clear technical responsibilities and integration expectations.

Establish evaluation criteria and production readiness requirements covering output quality, security, reliability, performance, cost, and supportability.

Establish a working relationship with the AI Innovation Lead, including clear handoffs and an agreed collaboration rhythm throughout prioritization, development, rollout, and adoption.

Core Technical Requirements
LLM Application Development
Hands-on experience building production LLM-based applications, including prompt engineering, retrieval-augmented generation (RAG), and document processing pipelines.

Experience with knowledge retrieval systems using vector search and semantic indexing.

Experience with intelligent document processing, including OCR, document classification, and structured data extraction from unstructured sources.

Practical understanding of when LLM-based approaches are the right solution and when simpler methods are more appropriate, and the ability to make that case clearly.

Experience evaluating AI output quality and implementing safeguards against inaccurate responses, prompt injection, and unintended disclosure of sensitive data.

Microsoft Azure
Hands-on experience with Azure AI Services: Azure OpenAI Service, Azure AI Search, Azure Document Intelligence, and Azure Cognitive Services.

Working knowledge of Azure data and compute infrastructure relevant to AI workloads: Azure Blob Storage, Azure Data Lake, Azure Functions, and Azure Container Apps.

Experience with Azure DevOps for solution delivery and Azure AI Studio for model management and deployment.

Experience integrating AI applications with enterprise identity, access controls, secrets management, and monitoring services.

Compliance & Regulated Environments
Demonstrated experience designing AI solutions for FedRAMP-compliant or similarly regulated environments

Ability to translate compliance requirements into concrete architecture decisions and communicate them clearly to non-technical stakeholders

Experience protecting sensitive data and ensuring AI applications and retrieval systems enforce appropriate user permissions and source-system access restrictions.

Software Engineering Fundamentals& Technical Leadership
Proficiency in Python for AI application development

Experience designing APIs that expose AI capabilities to downstream applications

Demonstrated experience leading technical design, reviewing code, mentoring developers, and translating architectural decisions into implementation tasks.

Experience building maintainable production software using source control, automated testing, and continuous integration and deployment practices.

Familiarity with C# or TypeScript in Azure/.NET environments is a plus

AI Operations & Evaluation
Practical experience with LLMOps, including prompt and configuration versioning, evaluation frameworks, production monitoring, and troubleshooting.

Ability to assess and manage AI solution quality, latency, reliability, and operating costs.

Experience planning for model and service changes, regression testing, and ongoing maintenance.

Qualifications:

Required

• 7+ years of experience in software engineering, solutions architecture, or a related technical field, with at least 3 years focused on AI or machine learning systems
• Demonstrated track record of designing and delivering AI solutions in production - not just prototypes or proofs of concept
• Experience setting technical direction for small engineering teams, including standards, patterns, and review practices
• Hands-on experience with Microsoft Azure, particularly Azure AI Services and Azure OpenAI
• Strong communication skills, able to translate complex technical decisions for non-technical audiences and build confidence with leadership teams that are new to AI
• Bachelor's degree in computer science, data science, software engineering, or a related field; advanced degree preferred but not required where equivalent experience is demonstrated
• Employee must be a U.S. citizen by birth or naturalization, or a green card lawful U.S. permanent resident, or a political asylum in the U.S. Individual must meet the definition of "a U.S. person" upon hire due to the risk assessment of this position.
• This position is subject to a background check that includes a review of criminal records. In reviewing an applicant's criminal history, the company will consider prior criminal convictions that have a relationship to the job duties and responsibilities of the position. The company considers the nature of the crime, the time that has elapsed since the crime and the job duties for the position at issue in making an individualized determination. Individuals may be excluded when the company determines, based on the above factors, that hiring, transferring or promoting the applicant would pose an unreasonable risk to the business, its employees or its customers and vendors.

Preferred Qualifications:

The following skills are valued and will strengthen a candidate's profile.

• Agentic workflow design, including multi-step orchestration using frameworks such as LangChain, Semantic Kernel, or AutoGen
• LLMOps practices including prompt versioning, output observability, and evaluation frameworks
• Containerization (Docker, Kubernetes) and infrastructure-as-code (Terraform, Bicep)
• Microsoft Power Platform (Power Automate, Copilot Studio) as a delivery layer for workflow automation
• Model Context Protocol (MCP) or equivalent standards for connecting AI models to organizational data and tools

Physical Requirements:

The physical demands described here are representative of those that must be met by an employee to successfully perform the essential functions of this job. Reasonable accommodations may be made to enable individuals with disabilities to perform the essential functions.

Regular physical activity to include walking, bending, stooping, reaching, standing and prolonged sitting.

Ability to speak, read, hear, and write, with or without reasonable accommodation.

Ability to use phone and computer systems, copier, fax, and other office equipment.

Must be able to occasionally move/lift up to 25 pounds with or without reasonable accommodation.

Work Environment:

This position is located in an air-conditioned, environmentally controlled atmosphere. Noise level in the work environment is usually moderate and the distraction level in the work environment is often heavy.

ATI is an Equal Opportunity Employer of Minorities, Females, Protected Veterans, and Individual with Disabilities.

ATI complies with the Pay Transparency Nondiscrimination provision mandated by Executive Order 13665.

Apply at ATI.ORG; we only accept applications submitted through our applicant tracking system. If you require accommodations to complete this application, please contact Human Resources at (843) 760-4350 or email hr@ati.org.

Anticipated starting salary is in range commensurate with education and experience:
$145,000 - $200,000