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About This Role
EPAM is seeking a Senior Service Delivery Manager or Service Delivery Director to be the single point of accountability for AI-native Managed Services programs, covering both Build and Run for one of our Energy clients. The scope spans AMS, infrastructure and data platform operations, and product sustain. You will lead delivery governance, commercial management, and executive client relationships. An entrepreneurial mindset is essential.
Req# 1099725045
Responsibilities
- Own program health across all workstreams: governance cadence, KPIs, SLAs, escalations, and risks
- Run the RAID process and define reporting, dashboards, and steering committee packs
- Drive consistent delivery practices, tooling, and quality standards across workstreams
- Be EPAM’s primary relationship owner with senior client stakeholders across geographies
- Lead steering committees, QBRs, and executive briefings; translate delivery performance into business language for C-level audiences
- Build trusted advisor relationships that position EPAM for long-term growth
- Lead knowledge transfer from incumbent vendors, onboard EPAM teams, and establish steady-state operations
- Design the target operating model with AI-native capabilities (agentic workflows, GenAI copilots, intelligent monitoring) built in before go-live
- Stand up monitoring and alerting during Build so each account launches with early warning in place
- Own the transition risk plan, readiness criteria, go/no-go checkpoints, and hypercare with zero disruption to critical operations
- Own incident and problem management, and hold system performance and stability within agreed SLAs
- Tune automation and AI-native tooling in production, and feed lessons back into Build
- Reduce recurring incidents and ticket volume through root-cause fixes and automation
- Own the GenAI and automation roadmap as core to the delivery model, not a side initiative
- Keep AI-native capabilities current and share proven practices across EPAM
- Own revenue forecasting, margin tracking, cost modelling, and billing accuracy
- Manage SOWs and change requests; protect against uncompensated scope creep
- Develop organic growth opportunities and lead expansion proposals with the account team
- Lead and develop workstream leads, delivery managers, and specialists in a high-accountability culture
- Improve employee NPS and reduce project attrition
- Contribute to talent acquisition, succession planning, and EPAM’s delivery management community
Requirements
- 10+ years in Managed Services or IT delivery leadership, with direct ownership of both Build and Run (steady-state operations)
- Proven experience managing large-scale, complex programs with strategic business impact
- An entrepreneurial mindset: ownership, initiative, and a drive to build and grow
- Expertise in vendor consolidation, including transition execution and knowledge retention
- Strong background in Application Managed Services delivery and governance
- Hands-on experience implementing AI-native solutions and process automation
- Solid experience in the energy sector
- Track record of AI-driven optimization with measurable outcomes
- Ability to drive efficiency and cost optimization through technology-driven process improvement
- Working knowledge of service design, SIAM, ITIL, DevOps, and monitoring and alerting at scale
- Track record of improving client satisfaction and employee NPS, including reducing attrition
- Creative problem-solving in restrictive or highly regulated environments
- Excellent negotiation, influencing, and communication skills with senior stakeholders
- Bachelor’s or Master’s degree in Computer Science, Engineering, or a related field
Nice to have
- ITIL v4/v5 certification or equivalent
- Cloud platform experience (AWS, Azure, or GCP)
- Experience restructuring delivery teams to meet changing business objectives
We offer
- Medical, Dental and Vision Insurance (Subsidized)
- Health Savings Account
- Flexible Spending Accounts (Healthcare, Dependent Care, Commuter)
- Short-Term and Long-Term Disability (Company Provided)
- Life and AD&D Insurance (Company Provided)
- Employee Assistance Program
- Unlimited access to LinkedIn learning solutions
- Matched 401(k) Retirement Savings Plan
- Paid Time Off
- Legal Plan and Identity Theft Protection
- Accident Insurance
- Employee Discounts
- Pet Insurance
- Employee Stock Purchase Program
EPAM is a leading global provider of digital platform engineering and development services. We are committed to having a positive impact on our clients, our employees, and our communities. We embrace a dynamic and inclusive culture. Here you will collaborate with multi-national teams, contribute to a myriad of innovative projects that deliver the most creative and cutting-edge solutions, and have an opportunity to continuously learn and grow. No matter where you are located, you will join a dedicated, creative, and diverse community that will help you discover your fullest potential.
Engineer the Future with a Career at EPAM
This posting includes a good faith range of the salary EPAM would reasonably expect to pay the selected candidate. The range provided reflects base salary only. Individual compensation offers within the range are based on a variety of factors, including, but not limited to: geographic location, experience, credentials, education, training, the demand for the role; and overall business and labor market considerations. Most candidates are hired at a salary within the range disclosed. Salary range: $180,000-$240,000 USD. This position is also eligible for variable compensation incentives. In addition, the details highlighted in this job posting above are a general description of all other expected benefits and compensation for the position.
Applications will be accepted on a rolling basis.
EPAM will not provide new H-1B visa sponsorship for this position. Candidates with existing transferable H-1B status may be considered.
Salary Context
This $180K-$240K range is above the median for AI/ML Engineer roles in our dataset (median: $178K across 1623 roles with salary data).
View full AI/ML Engineer salary data →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 9,079 AI roles we're tracking, AI/ML Engineer positions make up 76% of the market. At EPAM Systems, 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 $211,950 based on 13,048 positions with disclosed compensation. Director-level AI roles across all categories have a median of $272,300. Disclosed range: $180K to $240K.
Across all AI roles, the market median is $213,000. Top-quartile compensation starts at $263,911. The 90th percentile reaches $318,400. For comparison, the highest-paying categories include AI Safety ($256,000) and Research Engineer ($252,000). By seniority level: Entry: $111,000; Mid: $193,200; Senior: $229,300; Director: $272,300; VP: $235,830.
EPAM Systems AI Hiring
EPAM Systems has 19 open AI roles right now. They're hiring across AI/ML Engineer, AI Product Manager, AI Consultant, MLOps Engineer. Positions span Remote, US, Houston, TX, Houston, TX, US. Compensation range: $180K - $240K.
Location Context
Across all AI roles, 6% (531 positions) offer remote work, while 8,478 require on-site attendance. Top AI hiring metros: New York (3,078 roles, $221,000 median); San Francisco (2,646 roles, $261,000 median); Los Angeles (1,486 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 9,079 open positions tracked in our dataset. By seniority: 106 entry-level, 4,384 mid-level, 3,343 senior, and 1,246 leadership roles (Director, VP, C-Level). Remote roles make up 6% of the market (531 positions). The remaining 8,478 roles require on-site or hybrid attendance.
The market median for AI roles is $213,000. Top-quartile compensation starts at $263,911. The 90th percentile reaches $318,400. Highest-paying categories: AI Safety ($256,000 median, 66 roles); Research Engineer ($252,000 median, 457 roles); AI Engineering Manager ($251,622 median, 55 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 9,079 open positions across 16 role categories. The largest categories by volume: AI/ML Engineer (6,862), AI Product Manager (453), AI Software Engineer (451). 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 (106) are outnumbered by mid-level (4,384) and senior (3,343) 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 1,246 positions, representing the bottleneck between technical execution and organizational strategy.
Remote work availability sits at 6% of all AI roles (531 positions), with 8,478 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 $213,000. Top-quartile roles start at $263,911, and the 90th percentile reaches $318,400. 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 $256,000 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 (1,649 postings), Aws (898 postings), Azure (723 postings), Rag (671 postings), Gcp (536 postings), Pytorch (434 postings), Claude (410 postings), Kubernetes (406 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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