Systems Planning & Analysis · 5 hours ago
Senior AI Systems Engineer
Colorado Springs, CO
Full-time
Hybrid
Senior Level, Lead/Staff
$160K/yr - $235K/yr
8+ years expSystems Planning and Analysis, Inc. (SPA) delivers high-impact, technical solutions to complex national security issues. They are seeking a Senior AI Systems Engineer to design, build, and operationalize AI capabilities across secure, mission-critical systems and platforms, focusing on transforming frontier AI capabilities into reliable, production-grade solutions.
AnalyticsInformation Technology
No H1B
Security Clearance RequiredU.S. Citizen Only
Responsibilities
Design and implement production AI-enabled services using modern foundation models via secure APIs
Build AI agents and agent-orchestrated workflows that support decision-making, automation, and system intelligence
Develop reference implementations (code, patterns, architectures) that other teams can adopt and extend
Integrate AI with structured and unstructured data sources, including knowledge graphs, embeddings, retrieval pipelines, and system telemetry
Implement human-in-the-loop mechanisms for oversight, escalation, and trust in high-consequence workflows
Expand AI usage beyond chat interfaces into platform capabilities, such as: log and telemetry analysis, operational anomaly detection, self-healing and automated remediation, runbook generation and improvement, documentation synthesis and maintenance
Enable downstream development teams to safely consume AI capabilities within their own applications through shared services, APIs, and patterns
Establish reusable approaches for AI integration across environments, rather than one-off implementations
Design AI solutions that operate in secure and controlled environments, with strong attention to: access control and least privilege, auditability and traceability, data handling boundaries, logging and monitoring
Embed Responsible AI principles into system design, including transparency, controllability, and failure awareness
Partner with security and platform teams to ensure AI capabilities meet operational, compliance, and accreditation expectations
Write production code weekly, not just architecture diagrams
Prototype, harden, and productionize AI-enabled capabilities
Participate in code reviews, design reviews, and technical decision-making
Balance speed with rigor—moving fast without breaking trust
Qualification
Required
US Citizen and current active DoD Secret clearance
Minimum 8 years of professional software engineering experience, with a strong foundation in backend or platform engineering
Bachelor's degree in Computer Science, Engineering, or related field
Demonstrated experience shipping and maintaining production systems
Strong proficiency in at least one modern programming language (e.g., Python, Go, Java, TypeScript)
Hands-on experience integrating foundation models via APIs (e.g., OpenAI-compatible or equivalent services)
Experience building AI agents, orchestration workflows, or tool-using models
Familiarity with retrieval-augmented generation (RAG), embeddings, vector search, and knowledge-based AI patterns
Practical understanding of AI failure modes, hallucinations, and mitigation strategies
Experience designing or contributing to platform services, shared tooling, or developer enablement capabilities
Familiarity with cloud-native architectures, containerization, and service-based systems
Experience working with logs, metrics, telemetry, or operational analytics
Experience implementing systems in secure, regulated, or high-consequence environments
Understanding of access control, audit logging, and secure API design
Familiarity with Responsible AI concepts such as human-in-the-loop, explainability, and governance (practical application, not policy theory)
Benefits
Health insurance
Flexible spending accounts
Health savings accounts
Retirement savings plans
Life and disability insurance programs
Programs that provide for both paid and unpaid time away from work
Company
Systems Planning & Analysis
Systems Planning & Analysis (SPA) is a leading global provider of data-driven analytical insights for critical national security programs.
1001-5000 employees
Funding
Current Stage
Late StageTotal Funding
unknown2021-10-06Acquired
Leadership Team
Rich Sawchak
Chief Executive Officer
Bruce Phillips
Vice President, Emerging Markets Growth
Recent News
Washington Technology
2025-12-13
2025-12-08
Washington Technology
2025-10-10
Company data provided by crunchbase