Principal Software Engineer / Architect – AI, CoCounsel FDE

Thomson Reuters•Frisco, TX

6d•$183,100 - $340,000•Hybrid

About The Position

Thomson Reuters is seeking a Principal Software Engineer / Architect – AI to join its CoCounsel Forward Deployed Engineering organization. This highly hands-on individual-contributor role works directly with customers to solve complex business and technical problems, design and build production AI solutions, and use customer-driven innovation to strengthen the broader CoCounsel product. The role combines deep software architecture and AI expertise with active engineering. The principal-level technical leader will lead complex technical engagements, influence senior engineers and product leaders, and help establish how AI solutions are securely deployed in enterprise customer environments. The position is not architecture-only or advisory: it requires actively writing, reviewing, and debugging production code. This posting is for proactive recruitment and may be used to fill current openings or future vacancies. The role uses a hybrid work model for office-based positions. Eligible office locations include New York City, San Francisco, Los Angeles, Irvine, McLean, and Washington, DC, with compensation varying by location. The role may also be eligible for an annual bonus based on enterprise and individual performance.

Requirements

12+ years of software engineering experience, including significant technical leadership at Principal, Architect, or senior individual-contributor level.
Recent hands-on software engineering experience, including personally writing, reviewing, and debugging production code.
Deep experience designing, building, and delivering complex production software systems.
Significant experience with AI/ML, Generative AI, or LLM-powered systems in production environments.
Experience architecting and delivering AI solutions that integrate with enterprise or customer-owned infrastructure.
Strong understanding of distributed systems, APIs, system integration, cloud architecture, scalability, reliability, security, and production operations.
Demonstrated experience leading complex technical initiatives or customer engagements end to end and influencing architecture and technical direction across multiple teams.
Ability to translate customer-specific technical work into reusable, scalable product capabilities in partnership with Product and Engineering.
Experience mentoring, reviewing, and providing technical direction to Senior and Staff-level engineers.
Strong communication and stakeholder-management skills, including representing technical strategy with engineers, product partners, executives, and customers.

Nice To Haves

Experience building or deploying LLM, agentic AI, retrieval-augmented generation (RAG), evaluation, or other Generative AI systems in production.
Experience in Forward Deployed Engineering, customer engineering, solutions engineering, or another deeply technical customer-facing engineering environment.
Experience working with large enterprise customers and complex customer-owned infrastructure.
Experience in legal technology, financial services, professional services, or other highly regulated environments.
Familiarity with security, privacy, governance, or fiduciary-grade requirements for enterprise AI deployment.
External technical presence through open-source contributions, publications, conference presentations, patents, technical communities, or equivalent industry recognition.
Experience influencing product strategy based on direct customer and field experience.

Responsibilities

Lead complex customer and technical engagements from discovery and architecture through production deployment, remaining technically involved throughout the lifecycle.
Design, build, and deploy production AI solutions in enterprise and customer-owned environments, personally contributing to and reviewing production code.
Set architectural direction for AI, distributed systems, integrations, security, reliability, and deployment, and guide Senior and Staff-level engineers.
Partner with customers, Product, and Engineering to translate customer needs and emerging patterns into scalable product capabilities, anticipate future needs, and shape the core CoCounsel roadmap.
Identify patterns across customer engagements and turn field learnings into reusable architectures, technical standards, platform improvements, and product direction.
Influence technical strategy across Forward Deployed Engineering and related Thomson Reuters teams by evaluating technologies, mentoring engineers, raising engineering and architectural standards, and advising senior leaders on high-impact technical decisions.
Communicate complex technical decisions to engineers, product leaders, executives, and customer stakeholders, including tradeoffs involving security, reliability, scalability, and business impact.

Benefits

Flexible work arrangements, including work from anywhere for up to 8 weeks per year.
Flexible vacation and paid time off, including sick and safe time and paid holidays.
Two company-wide Mental Health Days off annually.
Access to the Headspace app and Employee Assistance Program.
Health, dental, vision, disability, and life insurance programs.
Competitive 401(k) plan with company match.
Tuition reimbursement.
Employee incentive programs and potential annual bonus.
Two paid volunteer days off annually and opportunities for pro-bono consulting and ESG initiatives.
Flexible Spending and Health Savings Accounts.
Fitness reimbursement.
Parental leave.
Sabbatical leave.
Commuter benefits.
Adoption and surrogacy assistance.
Employee Stock Purchase Plan.
Optional hospital, accident and sickness insurance, optional life and AD&D insurance, and group legal identity theft protection, paid 100% by the employee.
Access to a 529 Plan.
Resources for mental, physical, and financial wellbeing.