AI Engineer - SME

ARSIEM$100K — $130K *
Technical Services
11 - 15 years of experience
Job Overview by Ladders

Qualifications

  • 18 years total experience with a Bachelor's or 15 years with a Master's in a related field.
  • Experience with design, development, or assessment of AI/ML applications.
  • Knowledge of large language models and modern AI application patterns.
  • Familiarity with frameworks like LangChain or Haystack.
  • Proficient in software development fundamentals and APIs.
  • Capacity to evaluate technical trade-offs for both technical teams and stakeholders.
  • Strong communication skills, both written and verbal.

Responsibilities

  • Provide advisory support to government teams on AI application development.
  • Recommend technical approaches for AI integration and evaluation.
  • Assess AI solutions involving modern techniques and frameworks.
  • Review and evaluate technical architectures and system risks.
  • Guide AI engineering practices related to performance and integration.
  • Compare and evaluate AI frameworks for mission-related use.
  • Develop technical guidance and prototypes for government stakeholders.
  • Support testing and validation of AI tool performance.

Benefits

  • Opportunity to work on cutting-edge AI technologies in a government setting.
  • Collaborative environment with diverse teams of engineers and leaders.
  • Access to professional development in emerging AI frameworks and techniques.
  • Ability to influence the design of AI systems that serve government missions.
  • Engagement in continuous learning and prototyping in a fast-moving field.
Full Job Description
ARSIEM is looking for an amazingly talented AI Engineer to join our team! In this role you will get to provide technical advisory support for the design, evaluation, and advancement of AI-enabled applications, tools, and workflows. This role is intended for a hands-on technical professional who understands how modern AI systems are built and can help guide teams developing practical solutions using large language models, agentic workflows, orchestration frameworks, and supporting software infrastructure.

The right candidate is a builder at heart-someone who explores new frameworks, prototypes ideas, and continuously teaches themselves emerging techniques. Curiosity and passion matter greatly in this role. We want someone who follows the fast-moving AI ecosystem because they genuinely enjoy it, not just because the job requires it.

This position will support one of our Government clients in Columbia, Maryland.

Responsibilities

  • Provide SETA support to government teams developing or assessing AI-enabled applications and tools.
  • Advise on technical approaches for AI application design, prototyping, integration, and evaluation.
  • Assess solutions involving LLMs, retrieval-augmented generation, tool use, agentic workflows, orchestration layers, prompt pipelines, and evaluation harnesses.
  • Support the review of architectures, development approaches, model usage patterns, and technical risk areas.
  • Advise on AI engineering considerations such as latency, reliability, observability, testability, guardrails, data flow, and system integration.
  • Evaluate and compare modern AI frameworks, agentic libraries, and experimentation harnesses for suitability in mission use cases.
  • Assist with the development of technical guidance, prototypes, engineering recommendations, and briefings for government stakeholders.
  • Support test and evaluation activities for AI tools, including performance assessment, qualitative review, and workflow validation.
  • Collaborate with platform engineers, product leads, mission users, and government leadership to ensure AI efforts remain technically grounded and operationally relevant.
  • Stay current on rapid changes in the AI ecosystem and provide informed recommendations on emerging tools and practices.


Minimum Qualifications

  • Min 18 years with Bachelors, 15 years with Master's degree in Computer Science, Engineering, Data Science, Mathematics, or related field.
  • Experience designing, building, integrating, or evaluating AI/ML-enabled applications or software tools.
  • Familiarity with modern AI application patterns, including LLM-based applications, RAG, prompt engineering, agentic systems, and AI-assisted workflows.
  • Working knowledge of one or more agentic or orchestration frameworks such as LangChain, LangGraph, Semantic Kernel, AutoGen, CrewAI, Haystack, LlamaIndex, or similar ecosystems.
  • Experience with software development fundamentals, APIs, data handling, and system integration.
  • Ability to assess technical tradeoffs and communicate them clearly to both engineers and government stakeholders.
  • Strong written and verbal communication skills.


Preferred Qualifications

  • Experience with Python, JavaScript/TypeScript, or similar languages commonly used in AI application development.
  • Familiarity with vector databases, embeddings, model APIs, evaluation frameworks, and agent testing harnesses.
  • Exposure to model hosting, inference pipelines, or cloud-based AI development environments.
  • Understanding of secure AI development practices, data protection, and operational constraints in government settings.
  • Experience supporting defense, cyber, intelligence, or mission application development.
  • Familiarity with human-in-the-loop workflows, AI assurance, and evaluation methodologies.


Clearance Requirement: This position requires an active TS/SCI with a polygraph. You must be a U.S. citizen for consideration.

Candidate Referral: Do you know someone who would be GREAT at this role? If you do, ARSIEM has a way for you to earn a bonus through our referral program for persons presenting NEW (not in our resume database) candidates who are successfully placed on one of our projects. The bonus for this position is $3,500, and the referrer is eligible to receive the sum for any applicant we place within 12 months of referral. The bonus is paid after the referred employee reaches 6 months of employment.

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