SourceDirect Talent · 4 months ago
Principal Software Engineer – AI Agents
San Francisco, CA
Full-time
Hybrid
Lead/Staff
$202K/yr - $237K/yr
10+ years expSourceDirect Talent is focused on building AI agents to empower professionals and end-users with intelligent products. The Principal Software Engineer – AI Agents will lead the design and development of AI systems while collaborating with various teams to ensure scalability and reliability of solutions.
AdviceManagement ConsultingTraining
Responsibilities
Lead the design, architecture, and development of AI agent platforms, including multi-agent orchestration, memory systems, long-running tasks, and multimodal interactions
Set technical direction for AI-powered systems, balancing near-term product delivery with long-term scalability
Partner with product and engineering leaders to identify opportunities for AI agent integration across workflows
Build backend services and APIs (primarily in Python with FastAPI) to support agent orchestration, memory, and secure tool access
Develop and integrate vector databases, embeddings, and semantic search capabilities
Drive system performance, reliability, observability, and security best practices
Mentor engineers across teams, fostering growth in AI, backend architecture, and software craftsmanship
Conduct hands-on prototyping and R&D to explore emerging AI frameworks and validate product fit
Qualification
Required
10+ years of professional software engineering experience, including large-scale production systems
1+ years of experience working with LLMs or deploying ML models in production
Proven technical leadership in architecture and end-to-end project delivery
Strong backend development skills in Python (FastAPI preferred)
Experience integrating with LLM APIs (OpenAI, Claude, AWS Bedrock, Vertex AI), vector databases, and RAG pipelines
Familiarity with multi-agent frameworks and orchestration patterns
Strong knowledge of system design, distributed systems, and architectural trade-offs
Excellent communication skills across technical and non-technical stakeholders
Preferred
Experience building production AI agents or frameworks
Familiarity with AWS for backend deployment
Experience with AI observability, MLOps, and CI/CD for AI pipelines
Benefits
This role may also be eligible for bonus and equity compensation.
Company
SourceDirect Talent
SourceDirect Talent is a management consulting firm offering talent management, sourcing training, and HR consulting services.
2-10 employees
Funding
Current Stage
Early StageCompany data provided by crunchbase