Applied AI Engineer (SWE3)

Location: Maryland, United States

Salary: $260,000–$285,000 per year, plus $65,000–$71,000 in immediately vested company 401(k) contributions.

Company

hirify.global develops software and applied AI capabilities for mission and operations customers.

What you will do

• Lead forward-deployed engagements with operations customers, translating ambiguous workflows into AI solutions from prototype through production.
• Architect and build Python agentic systems integrating LLMs, MCP servers, Skills, subagents, mission data, and operational tools.
• Design agent guardrails, including scoped permissions, human approval gates, and audit logging.
• Build evaluation suites with mission users to measure accuracy, reliability, and failure modes and determine field readiness.
• Evaluate models, frameworks, and AI design patterns; communicate tradeoffs to technical and government leadership.
• Mentor engineers, lead design and code reviews, and define standards for reviewing, testing, and validating AI-generated code.

Requirements

• 12 years of professional experience in software engineering, including advanced Python proficiency and production services, APIs, and data pipelines.
• Experience building LLM applications or agentic systems using tool/function calling, structured outputs, context management, and multi-step workflows.
• Experience working directly with end users or mission customers to deliver software from ambiguous operational problems.
• Experience designing tests, evaluations, or validation layers for AI or other non-deterministic systems.
• Experience using AI coding assistants or agents for code generation, refactoring, and debugging, with ownership of the resulting code.
• Technical leadership experience through technical leadership, design decisions, or mentoring.
• Experience with Git, CI/CD pipelines, preferably GitLab, Docker, Kubernetes, Jira, and Confluence.
• Strong written and verbal communication with technical and non-technical audiences.
• Applicants must already hold a TS/SCI clearance with a current Full Scope Polygraph. Candidates seeking clearance do not meet the minimum requirements, and clearance sponsorship or processing is not provided.
• A B.S. in a technical discipline is required, or four additional years of experience may substitute for the degree.

Nice to have

• Experience with Model Context Protocol, Skills, subagents, or multi-agent orchestration frameworks such as PydanticAI or LangGraph.
• Experience securing LLM applications against prompt injection, data leakage, and over-permissioned tool access.
• Experience with retrieval systems, RAG, vector databases, or Elasticsearch.
• Experience building spec-driven or autonomous development pipelines with AI coding agents.
• Prior forward-deployed or embedded customer-facing engineering experience.
• Experience with production CNO capabilities and operations, or end-to-end SIGINT collection and analysis systems.

Culture & Benefits

• Full-time role with forward-deployed work alongside operations customers and government stakeholders.
• Opportunity to shape engineering standards for AI-assisted software development and grow into project leadership.
• Immediate vesting of company 401(k) contributions valued at $65,000–$71,000.

Hiring process

• Apply only if the required TS/SCI clearance and current Full Scope Polygraph are already held; clearance sponsorship or processing is unavailable.