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About This Role
ABS Group is seeking an AI/ML Engineer to join our Artificial Intelligence Practice in support of a major federal modernization program. In this role, you will design, develop, and operationalize machine learning and artificial intelligence solutions that support mission applications and data-driven workflows.
You will help bring AI capabilities into production, build supporting pipelines and model operations workflows, and work across data science, engineering, and cloud teams to deliver scalable, secure, and trustworthy AI solutions. The scope of responsibility, degree of technical leadership, and level of independence expected will reflect the level at which this position is filled.
What You Will Do
- Design, develop, and operate AI and machine learning capabilities for production applications and data workflows
- Build and maintain data and model pipelines that support training, deployment, monitoring, and lifecycle management
- Partner with data scientists, developers, and cloud engineers to productionize AI solutions
- Implement
MLOps
and related engineering practices for model deployment, monitoring, retraining, and version control
- Support generative AI and large language model implementations, including prompt workflows, retrieval-augmented generation, and vector-based retrieval patterns
- Apply AI/ML to adjacent use cases such as test automation, workflow support, and operational optimization
- Contribute to CI/CD, observability, and operational support for AI systems in secure environments
- Support responsible AI and model governance practices, including explainability and compliance requirements
- Document architectures, workflows, and engineering standards for project delivery
What You Will Need
Level and Compensation: This position may be filled at multiple career levels based on business
need
and the selected candidate's qualifications, relevant experience, and demonstrated capability. Typical leveling for this role is as follows:
- Junior (0 to 4 years)
- Mid-Level (5 to 9 years)
- Senior (10 to 14 years)
- Principal (15 or more years)
These ranges are guidelines only and are not the sole determining factor in level. The posted compensation range reflects the full range across all possible levels. Individual offers will be based on the level at which the candidate is hired, as well as factors such as skills, experience, internal equity, and geographic market considerations where applicable.
Education and Experience
- Bachelor's degree in Computer Science
, Data Science, Software Engineering, Engineering, or a related technical field;
Master's
degree preferred
- Relevant professional experience in AI engineering, machine learning engineering, or related software engineering roles; the depth and scope of experience required will vary based on the level at which this position is filled
- Experience deploying or supporting machine learning and AI systems in production environments preferred
- Experience working in cloud-based or hybrid technical environments preferred
Knowledge, Skills, and Abilities
- Proficiency in
Python
- Familiarity with frameworks such as
TensorFlow ,
PyTorch
, and scikit-learn
- Familiarity with
MLOps
, CI/CD for ML, and model monitoring concepts and practices
- Exposure to
LLMOps
, AIOps , RAG , and vector databases
- Experience building or supporting data pipelines for AI/ML applications
- Understanding of software engineering and
DevSecOps
practices for production systems
- Strong collaboration skills across technical teams and stakeholders
Nice to Have
- Experience supporting production ML at scale
- Experience with AWS, Azure, or GCP AI/ML services
- Familiarity with federal, public sector, or regulated AI environments
- Exposure to NLP, classification, survey analytics, or entity resolution use cases
Location
This position is based in the Washington, D.C. metro area, with primary work performed in Suitland, Maryland. Remote or hybrid arrangements may be available for eligible work, subject to government approval.
Role Details
About This Role
AI/ML Engineers build and deploy machine learning models in production. They work across the full ML lifecycle: data pipelines, model training, evaluation, and serving infrastructure. The role has evolved significantly over the past two years. Where ML Engineers once spent most of their time on model architecture, the job now tilts heavily toward inference optimization, cost management, and integrating LLM capabilities into existing systems. Companies want engineers who can ship production systems, and the experimenter-only role is fading fast.
Day-to-day, you're writing training pipelines, debugging data quality issues, setting up evaluation frameworks, and figuring out why your model performs differently in staging than it did on your dev set. The best ML engineers are obsessive about reproducibility and measurement. They instrument everything. They know that a model is only as good as the data feeding it and the infrastructure serving it.
Across the 9,653 AI roles we're tracking, AI/ML Engineer positions make up 76% of the market. At American Bureau of Shipping (ABS), this role fits into their broader AI and engineering organization.
Demand for AI/ML Engineers has been strong and consistent. Unlike some AI roles that spike with hype cycles, ML engineering is a foundational need. Every company deploying AI models needs people who can keep them running, and the gap between research prototypes and production systems keeps growing.
What the Work Looks Like
A typical week might include: debugging a data pipeline that's silently dropping 3% of training examples, running A/B tests on a new model version, writing documentation for a feature flag system that lets you roll back model deployments, and reviewing a junior engineer's PR for a new evaluation metric. Meetings tend to be cross-functional since ML touches product, engineering, and data teams.
Demand for AI/ML Engineers has been strong and consistent. Unlike some AI roles that spike with hype cycles, ML engineering is a foundational need. Every company deploying AI models needs people who can keep them running, and the gap between research prototypes and production systems keeps growing.
Skills Required
Python and PyTorch dominate the requirements. Most roles expect experience with cloud platforms (AWS, GCP, or Azure) and familiarity with ML frameworks like TensorFlow or JAX. RAG (Retrieval-Augmented Generation) has become a top-3 skill requirement as companies integrate LLMs into their products. Docker and Kubernetes show up in about a third of postings, reflecting the production focus of the role.
Beyond the core stack, employers increasingly want experience with experiment tracking tools (MLflow, Weights & Biases), feature stores, and vector databases. Fine-tuning experience is valuable but less common than you'd think from reading Twitter. Most production LLM work is RAG and prompt engineering, not fine-tuning. If you have both, you're in a strong position.
Companies that are serious about AI/ML hiring tend to post specific infrastructure details in the job description: the frameworks they use, their model serving stack, their data pipeline tools. Vague postings that just say 'ML experience required' without specifics are often companies that haven't figured out what they need yet.
Compensation Benchmarks
AI/ML Engineer roles pay a median of $212,000 based on 11,857 positions with disclosed compensation. Mid-level AI roles across all categories have a median of $193,200.
Across all AI roles, the market median is $213,400. Top-quartile compensation starts at $264,230. The 90th percentile reaches $319,400. For comparison, the highest-paying categories include AI Safety ($253,100) and Research Engineer ($252,000). By seniority level: Entry: $110,408; Mid: $193,200; Senior: $228,700; Director: $272,275; VP: $235,000.
American Bureau of Shipping (ABS) AI Hiring
American Bureau of Shipping (ABS) has 2 open AI roles right now. They're hiring across AI/ML Engineer, Data Scientist. Based in Washington, DC, US.
Location Context
Across all AI roles, 6% (568 positions) offer remote work, while 9,010 require on-site attendance. Top AI hiring metros: New York (2,878 roles, $221,000 median); San Francisco (2,413 roles, $264,500 median); Los Angeles (1,340 roles, $210,000 median).
Career Path
Common paths into AI/ML Engineer roles include Data Scientist, Software Engineer, Research Engineer.
From here, career progression typically leads toward ML Architect, AI Engineering Manager, Principal ML Engineer.
The fastest path into ML engineering is through software engineering with a self-directed ML education. A CS degree helps, but production engineering skills matter more than academic credentials. Build something that works, deploy it, and measure it. That portfolio project is worth more than a Coursera certificate. For career growth, the fork comes around the senior level: go deep on technical complexity (staff/principal track) or move into managing ML teams.
What to Expect in Interviews
Expect system design questions around ML pipelines: how you'd build a training pipeline for a specific use case, handle data drift, or design A/B testing infrastructure for model deployments. Coding rounds typically involve Python, with emphasis on data manipulation (pandas, numpy) and algorithm implementation. Take-home assignments often ask you to build an end-to-end ML pipeline from raw data to deployed model.
When evaluating opportunities: Companies that are serious about AI/ML hiring tend to post specific infrastructure details in the job description: the frameworks they use, their model serving stack, their data pipeline tools. Vague postings that just say 'ML experience required' without specifics are often companies that haven't figured out what they need yet.
AI Hiring Overview
The AI job market has 9,653 open positions tracked in our dataset. By seniority: 193 entry-level, 4,500 mid-level, 3,455 senior, and 1,505 leadership roles (Director, VP, C-Level). Remote roles make up 6% of the market (568 positions). The remaining 9,010 roles require on-site or hybrid attendance.
The market median for AI roles is $213,400. Top-quartile compensation starts at $264,230. The 90th percentile reaches $319,400. Highest-paying categories: AI Safety ($253,100 median, 57 roles); Research Engineer ($252,000 median, 419 roles); AI Engineering Manager ($251,622 median, 51 roles).
Demand for AI/ML Engineers has been strong and consistent. Unlike some AI roles that spike with hype cycles, ML engineering is a foundational need. Every company deploying AI models needs people who can keep them running, and the gap between research prototypes and production systems keeps growing.
The AI Job Market Today
The AI job market spans 9,653 open positions across 16 role categories. The largest categories by volume: AI/ML Engineer (7,301), Data Scientist (441), AI Software Engineer (438). These three account for the majority of open positions, though smaller categories often have higher per-role compensation because of specialized skill requirements.
The seniority mix tells a story about where AI teams are in their maturity. Entry-level roles (193) are outnumbered by mid-level (4,500) and senior (3,455) positions, reflecting that most companies are past the 'build a team from scratch' phase and need experienced engineers who can ship production systems. Leadership roles (Director, VP, C-Level) total 1,505 positions, representing the bottleneck between technical execution and organizational strategy.
Remote work availability sits at 6% of all AI roles (568 positions), with 9,010 requiring on-site or hybrid attendance. The remote share has stabilized after the post-pandemic correction. Senior and specialized roles (Research Scientist, ML Architect) are more likely to be remote-eligible than entry-level positions, partly because experienced hires have more negotiating power and partly because these roles require less hands-on mentorship.
AI compensation is structured in clear tiers. The market median sits at $213,400. Top-quartile roles start at $264,230, and the 90th percentile reaches $319,400. These figures include base salary with disclosed compensation. Total compensation (including equity, bonuses, and sign-on) runs 20-40% higher at companies that offer those components.
Category matters for compensation. AI Safety roles lead at $253,100 median, while Prompt Engineer roles sit at $141,440. The spread between highest and lowest-paying categories reflects the premium on specialized technical skills versus broader analytical roles.
The most in-demand skills across all AI postings: Python (1,605 postings), Aws (916 postings), Azure (724 postings), Rag (634 postings), Gcp (522 postings), Pytorch (495 postings), Kubernetes (384 postings), Claude (383 postings). Python dominates, appearing in the vast majority of role descriptions regardless of category. Cloud platform experience (AWS, GCP, Azure) is the second most common requirement. The newer entrants to the top skills list (RAG, vector databases, LLM APIs) reflect the shift from traditional ML toward generative AI applications.
Frequently Asked Questions
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