AI Agent Engineer

Pelago•New York, NY

4h•Hybrid

About The Position

Pelago is the world’s leading virtual clinic for Substance Use Management. Our program provides guidance, support and treatment for members seeking to overcome their tobacco, alcohol and opioid use. From unhealthy habits to active substance use disorders, Pelago delivers a personalized solution based on individual health, habits, genetics, and goals, providing care for members wherever they might be on the substance use spectrum. Pelago's suite of virtual services ranges from education, to cognitive behavioral therapy (CBT) to comprehensive medication-assisted treatment (MAT). Pelago enables employers and health plans to deliver accessible, affordable, and effective treatment for substance misuse. Pelago has scaled to helping hundreds of employers and health plans and has already helped more than 750,000 members manage their substance use better. We have recently closed our Series C and raised over $151m from leading global investors. If you are passionate about making an impact on the health of others, join us and make it happen! About Pelago Engineering: Our engineering team operates as empowered, outcome-oriented problem solvers, working in close partnership with product, design, and clinical teams to improve member outcomes at scale. As AI transforms how software is built, we are intentionally evolving our development lifecycle so we spend less time on mechanical implementation and more time on system design, judgment, and impact. How We Work: Outcome-driven: Engineers are given problems to solve, not just features to build. Success is measured by learning, impact, and outcomes—not velocity alone AI-native: We use AI across the SDLC to accelerate implementation, testing, and review. Engineers focus on defining intent, validating behavior, and designing resilient systems High autonomy, high accountability: Teams have real ownership over their domains. With autonomy comes responsibility for quality, safety, and results Cross-functional by default: Engineers partner deeply with Product, Design, Data, and Clinical. Discovery, experimentation, and delivery are shared responsibilities Quality and safety matter: We build in a regulated, member-impacting domain. Reliability, observability, and correctness are first-class concerns Overview of the Role: Pelago is building a small AI Accelerator team to lead one of the most important transformations in our company's evolution: rethinking how work gets done so our teams can focus on the decisions, relationships, and problem-solving that matter most. As an AI Agent Engineer, you'll identify workflows that are repetitive, manual, or unnecessarily complex and redesign them as AI-powered systems that meaningfully change how we operate. That might mean automating parts of compliance reviews, streamlining member operations, or replacing spreadsheet-heavy analytics handoffs with smarter, more reliable workflows. This is a hands-on role for someone who wants to be an innovator and change driver, applying AI to real business problems and leaving a visible mark on how the company runs. This is a hybrid role with a high-collaboration rhythm (3 days/week in our NYC office).

Requirements

Experience building production-grade software systems, ideally in product or operational environments, autonomously
Strong Python skills and experience designing event-driven or distributed systems
Hands-on experience building and deploying LLM-powered workflows: tool use, retrieval, structured outputs, orchestration
Experience integrating systems via APIs, message queues, or workflow engines
Familiarity with cloud infrastructure (AWS, GCP, or Azure) and deploying containerized services
Solid understanding of security, privacy, and data controls. especially in regulated environments
Systems thinker who can translate messy real-world processes into scalable technical solutions
Pragmatic builder who prototypes quickly but ships responsibly
A genuine passion for using AI to create measurable operational impact

Responsibilities

Identify high-friction internal workflows and redesign them as AI-powered systems that meaningfully improve how Pelago operates
Design, build, and deploy production-grade AI agents that connect to internal APIs, databases, and tools (Salesforce, Slack, Notion, and more)
Integrate LLMs into real operational processes — from compliance reviews and ticket triage to documentation and QA — ensuring systems are reliable, secure, and auditable
Build observability, guardrails, and evaluation frameworks so agents perform safely and consistently in a regulated healthcare environment
Partner closely with product, operations, data, and compliance teams to define success metrics, iterate quickly, and continuously improve performance

Benefits

Generous and meaningful equity package
Full Medical, Dental, & Vision coverage
401k Plan
Unlimited PTO Policy, 10 paid holidays, & company wide “Me Time” Days
Paid maternity, paternity & new parent leave
Flexible working environment
Annual Learning and Development stipend to support continued learning and career development
Wellness Reimbursement Program
Access to Reproductive & Family Planning Care
Substance Use Support for employees and family members