Staff Research Scientist

Guild

2d • $220,000 - $260,000

About The Position

We are seeking a Staff Research Scientist to lead deep, foundational AI research and post-research implementation that powers our next-generation enterprise AI platform, Apollo. This is a discovery-driven position focused on building new AI capabilities, not feature iteration, spanning advanced platform capabilities including memory architectures, orchestration layers (intent, tone, personality), reinforcement learning systems, and comprehensive evaluation frameworks. You will drive full end-to-end enterprise adoption by translating cutting-edge research into production-ready systems in close partnership with engineering teams.

Requirements

• MS or PhD in Machine Learning, AI, or a related field
• Strong background in deep learning, reinforcement learning, and large language models
• Experience with model evaluation methodologies and safety frameworks
• Demonstrated ability to design novel AI systems from first principles
• A strong research-to-production mindset, with proven experience taking research from concept to deployed capability

Nice To Haves

• Prior experience publishing research or contributing to external technical publications or patents

Responsibilities

• Conduct advanced research across memory systems, orchestration frameworks, reinforcement learning, and evaluation layers, contributing approximately 20% of your time to deep exploration of novel problem spaces.
• Design novel AI architectures that support persistent memory, controllable agent behavior, and enterprise-grade reliability, applying first-principles thinking to produce scalable and production-ready solutions.
• Develop advanced evaluation frameworks that assess not only model performance, but also input integrity, output quality, safety, and alignment, going beyond traditional benchmarking.
• Explore and prototype new AI platform layers through continuous discovery and experimentation, maintaining a research cadence that drives long-term platform differentiation.
• Translate cutting-edge research into production-ready capabilities in partnership with engineering teams, bridging the gap between research and real-world deployment.
• Publish internal research memos, technical documentation, architectural proposals, external white papers, and external patents to advance both internal knowledge-sharing and external thought leadership.

Benefits

• Access to low-cost, high-quality health care options through Collective Health and Kaiser (due to coverage limitations, Kaiser is currently only available in CA & CO)
• Access to a 401k to help save for the future
• Vacation policy to rest and recharge
• 8 days of fully-paid sick leave, to take the time to heal and or recover
• Family-friendly benefits, including 12 weeks of parental leave for non-birthing parents and 18-20 weeks for birthing parents; 4-week ramp-up period for when employees return from a leave of 6 weeks or more; as well as employer-paid short-term and long-term disability, employer-sponsored life insurance, fertility and caregiving benefits.
• Well-rounded wellness benefits including free and low cost mental health resources and financial wellbeing support services
• Education benefits and tuition assistance to help your future development and growth

What This Job Offers

• Job Type: Full-time
• Career Level: Mid Level