Staff Applied AI Engineer

Collectors • Los Angeles, CA

4d • $165,848 - $269,259

About The Position

Collectors is seeking a Staff Applied AI Engineer to join its Applied AI function. This embedded, hands-on role has portfolio-level ownership of a business domain. The engineer will identify and prioritize AI opportunities across a lane such as Operations, Marketplace, or Finance, build and ship solutions end-to-end, and establish reusable patterns that help the broader team deliver effectively. The role is product-minded and build-first, combining rapid prototyping and demonstrated business value with responsibility for a durable domain portfolio.

The engineer will spend most of their time building, including taking technically difficult or high-risk use cases from prototype through production, adoption, and measured impact. They will work closely with business leaders, earn stakeholder trust, shape roadmaps, and account for cumulative portfolio outcomes. They will also develop agent systems with traces, evaluations, and human-in-the-loop controls that support evidence-based increases in autonomy; use Claude, OpenAI, and the company's orchestration platform; and build production-grade applications around AI workflows. The role includes reviewing designs and code, supporting other engineers, and helping raise the team's hiring and technical standards.

The position reports to the Head of Applied AI. Remote or hybrid candidates will be considered, with the company noting the value of in-person collaboration. The salary range is $165,848-$269,259; actual compensation varies based on location, job level, experience, and skill set. The role may also be eligible for bonuses, commissions, or other compensation.

Requirements

• Demonstrated hands-on, build-first approach and bias toward shipping.
• Experience owning a domain, program, or product area and choosing its roadmap, with the ability to explain prioritization decisions and outcomes.
• Experience shipping multiple end-to-end agentic or AI-powered solutions to real users in more than one context, and explaining value, tools, trade-offs, and lessons learned.
• Fluent daily use of Claude, OpenAI, or similar models, with evidence-based opinions on frameworks, evaluations, and orchestration.
• Ability to translate business leaders' strategic concerns into a scoped and sequenced portfolio of working software.
• Strong technical capability to independently architect and build agent systems, make build-versus-reuse decisions, and participate in design reviews with principal-level engineers.
• Hands-on experience building and shipping production applications, preferably full-stack, with sound architectural judgment across frontend and backend systems.
• Ability to measure outcomes and business value and take accountability for portfolio impact.
• Track record of improving other engineers through review, mentorship, patterns, or tooling.
• Clear communication with operators, engineers, and executives, including the ability to engage skeptical stakeholders.
• Commitment to continuous learning and actively evaluating new models, tools, and techniques.

Responsibilities

• Own the AI opportunity across a business domain by mapping workflows, sizing opportunities, and prioritizing what to build and why.
• Personally build the first, riskiest, or most technically demanding use cases in the domain, taking them from prototype through production, adoption, and measured impact.
• Identify recurring patterns across projects and turn them into reusable assets such as connectors, evaluation harnesses, and workflow patterns.
• Instrument outcomes before building and report the cumulative business value delivered across the portfolio to domain leadership.
• Design agents with traces, evaluations, and human-in-the-loop gates to enable evidence-based increases in autonomy.
• Use Claude, OpenAI, and the company's orchestration platform, and inform team platform choices with current perspectives on models, harnesses, and tooling.
• Build trust with functional leaders, navigate competing priorities, secure sponsorship, and maintain stakeholder engagement through delivery.
• Review designs and code, unblock senior and mid-level engineers, contribute to hiring through interviewing, and help other builders improve.
• Design and implement production-grade application layers around agents and AI workflows, accounting for frontend APIs, state, latency, reliability, security, and scalability.

Benefits

• Medical, dental, and vision insurance for eligible full-time employees.
• Fertility, commuter, and educational assistance benefits for eligible full-time employees.
• 401(k) matching plan.
• Flexible time off for salaried employees.
• Ten company-paid holidays for regular, full-time employees.
• Discounts on select grading services for approved submissions.
• Flexible schedules offered by many teams, with varying shifts and accommodation support.
• Team celebrations, holiday events, and team-building activities.

What This Job Offers

• Job Type: Full-time
• Career Level: Senior
• Education Level: No Education Listed