Principal Engineer – AI Productivity Lab (AI)

Location: Hybrid, with at least two days per week or 40% of working time in an office in London, Bristol, Edinburgh, Leeds, or Manchester

Salary: £92,701–£169,403 per year, depending on location and experience

Company

hirify.global is a major financial services organisation developing data, AI, and digital capabilities for the future of finance.

What you will do

• Lead engineering of domain-specific agents, tools, and automations for priority business areas, taking solutions from prototype to operational MVP.
• Design and build reusable capabilities for the AI Productivity Lab’s coworking platform and repositories, including skills, tools, and operating procedure assets.
• Evaluate agentic coding and coworking technologies and open-source solutions to recommend approaches and accelerate delivery.
• Partner with business stakeholders and line-of-business champions to define use cases, embed agents into SOPs and team tooling, and measure business outcomes.
• Coach and mentor engineers through technical leadership, code reviews, and constructive feedback while guiding senior stakeholders on technical direction.

Requirements

• Proven experience leading delivery of technology solutions to business areas in complex production environments with ownership of business outcomes.
• Extensive knowledge and hands-on experience in solutions architecture, software engineering, and business process automation.
• Strong hands-on experience with agentic coding or coworking technologies and ecosystems, such as Claude Code, Cowork, OpenClaw, or GitHub Copilot.
• Strong understanding of operational processes and risk management; financial services experience is preferred.
• Ability to influence stakeholders, guide teams through ambiguity, and translate productivity opportunities into technical direction and MVPs.

Nice to have

• Knowledge management, enterprise ontology, or knowledge graph expertise.
• Business process optimisation experience, including Business Process Modelling or Lean Six Sigma.
• Experience with applied research and experimentation.
• Advanced degree in computer science, artificial intelligence, or a related subject.

Culture & Benefits

• Inclusive working environment focused on diversity, belonging, and professional development.
• Pension contribution of up to 15% and an annual performance-related bonus.
• Share schemes, including free shares, and lifestyle benefits such as discounted shopping.
• 30 days of annual leave plus bank holidays.
• Wellbeing initiatives and generous parental leave policies.