Principal AI Engineer - Midtown, NY
Midwestern Interactive Growth Team
- Location
- Remote (New York, NY)
- Employment
- Contract
- Level
- Senior Level
Posted 2 days ago
About the Role
Midwestern Interactive is seeking a Principal AI Engineer to lead the design, governance, and production-readiness of AI/ML engineering across a product portfolio. This hands-on technical leadership role involves building reusable internal tooling, establishing AI security policies, and mentoring engineering teams to ensure scalable delivery.
Skills
Python
AI/ML Frameworks
Cloud Infrastructure
LLM Integration
Microservices Architecture
Docker
Terraform
DevOps
CI/CD
AI Governance
Security Compliance
Infrastructure-as-code
Data Infrastructure
Technical Leadership
Agile Methodologies
Prompt Engineering
Perks
- Hybrid Work
Full job details
About the Role
The Principal AI Engineer sits at the intersection of software engineering, data science, platform architecture, and AI governance. You will be the technical owner of how AI/ML engineering is designed, built, governed, and shipped across a portfolio of products serving all of AlixPartners domains.
This is a hands-on engineering and technical leadership position. You will move fluidly between writing production code, architecting multi-tenant AI services, building internal developer tooling, leading security and governance design, and mentoring engineering teams. Your success is measured by team-level outcomes - scalable patterns that outlast
your direct involvement.
Location: New York (Hybrid - Midtown)
Work Arrangements: Open to 1099, C2C or W2
Duration: 12 month contract - high likelihood of extension based on performance
Travel: None
What You'll Do
AI Productization & Platform Engineering
• Design and own the firm's AI productization & governance playbook, covering service patterns, security/compliance standards, model evaluation rubrics, and production-readiness criteria.
• Build and maintain reusable internal tooling, including AI service scaffolding, evaluation and monitoring tooling, and data infrastructure - designed for team adoption without ongoing hand-holding.
• Establish AI agent governance policies covering agent permissions, code execution controls, access to internal systems, and human-in-the-loop enforcement.
• Partner with Security, Legal, and Compliance to define SOC2/ISO-aligned AI controls, vendor DPA requirements, and prompt data classification policies.
• Establish standardized deployment patterns using containerization, infrastructure-as-code, and CI/CD pipeline templates reusable across teams.
Developer Experience & Engineering Excellence
• Champion AI-assisted development practices across the engineering org, including LLM-integrated development workflows, test-driven development patterns, and reusable tooling standards that scale across teams.
• Codify modern software development standards (CI/CD, DevOps, testing, delivery quality) referenced by multiple teams as a baseline for new or re- platformed products.
• Mentor engineers and tech leads with observable improvement in delivery consistency, design quality, and production readiness rigor.
Cross-Functional Leadership & Stakeholder Influence
• Serve as the go-to technical authority on AI/ML, platform architecture, and engineering practices - regularly consulted by senior stakeholders at the design and strategy stages.
• Bridge technical and non-technical stakeholders, translating complex architectural decisions, AI risk topics, and platform tradeoffs into clear, actionable guidance.
What You'll Need
• 12+ years in software engineering, data science, or a closely related technical field.
• Bachelor's degree or higher in Computer Science, Engineering, or a related field preferred.
• Deep expertise in AI/ML frameworks and the Python ecosystem, with hands-on experience deploying models to public cloud infrastructure.
• Demonstrated experience designing and operating multi-tenant AI services and LLM integrations in production.
• Proven track record leading microservices architecture - decomposing monoliths, defining service contracts, and operationalizing CI/CD for distributed systems.
• Strong hands-on command of containerization (Docker), infrastructure-as-code (Terraform), and modern DevOps practices.
• Substantive experience with AI/LLM security - including prompt injection, data boundary enforcement, model supply chain risk, and AI-specific threat modeling.
• Strong problem-solving skills, especially in building governance frameworks, evaluation rubrics, and reusable platform patterns at scale.
• Excellent written and verbal communication skills in English; ability to translate complex technical topics to diverse audiences, including executive stakeholders.
• Experience with Agile methodologies and cross-functional product team collaboration.
Preferred / Additional Qualifications
• Experience applying AI/ML in business consulting, advisory, or professional services contexts.
• Familiarity with AI service interface and gateway design patterns, including emerging AI integration protocols.
• Contributions to open-source AI/ML projects, publications, or active involvement in technical communities.
• Advanced certifications in AI, deep learning, cloud architecture, or security (e.g., AWS/GCP/Azure ML, CISSP).
• Experience defining AI compliance controls for SOC2, ISO 27001, or TISAX frameworks.
• Demonstrated enthusiasm for developer education - writing internal guides, running workshops, or building internal tooling communities.
• Proficiency in additional languages is a plus (Go, Typescript)
• Demonstrated ability and enthusiasm to mentor and uplift junior team members or peers
• Willingness to work outside of normal business hours, and in particular as unique projects/needs arise.