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About This Role
Lead Software \& AI Engineer
Position Overview
G2IT is seeking a highly skilled Lead Software \& AI Engineer to support mission\-critical Department of Defense initiatives. The ideal candidate will possess extensive experience in software engineering, cloud\-native application development, DevSecOps, and Artificial Intelligence/Machine Learning (AI/ML) integration within operational environments.
This position requires a technical leader capable of designing, developing, and deploying advanced software solutions while integrating Machine Learning, Artificial Intelligence, and Large Language Models (LLMs) into secure enterprise and mission systems.
Security Clearance Requirements
- Active Top Secret/SCI clearance or TS/SCI eligibility with a completed Tier 5 investigation at the time of submission.
Required Qualifications
- Minimum five (5\) years of hands\-on experience developing and supporting microservices\-based architectures.
- Minimum five (5\) years of experience with containerized applications and Kubernetes\-based environments.
- Demonstrated experience developing, integrating, or deploying Machine Learning (ML), Artificial Intelligence (AI), and/or Large Language Models (LLMs) within operational systems.
- DoD 8140/8570 IAT Level II certification and/or intermediate proficiency baseline certification for Cyber Workforce Framework (CSWF) approval, such as:
- + Security\+ CE
+ CySA\+
+ Equivalent approved certification
- Strong understanding of secure software development practices and DevSecOps methodologies.
- Excellent analytical, problem\-solving, communication, and leadership skills.
Key Responsibilities
- Lead the design, development, integration, and deployment of cloud\-native software solutions supporting mission\-critical operations.
- Architect and implement AI/ML and LLM\-enabled capabilities within enterprise and operational systems.
- Design and develop scalable microservices and APIs using modern software engineering practices.
- Collaborate with government and contractor stakeholders to define technical requirements and deliver innovative solutions.
- Provide technical leadership, mentorship, and guidance to development and engineering teams.
- Support system modernization efforts through automation, cloud adoption, and DevSecOps best practices.
- Ensure security, scalability, reliability, and maintainability across all software solutions.
Technical Requirements
Artificial Intelligence \& Machine Learning
- Experience developing, integrating, and operationalizing:
- + Machine Learning models
+ Artificial Intelligence solutions
+ Large Language Models (LLMs)
+ AI\-enabled workflows and applications
- Familiarity with modern AI frameworks, model deployment, inference pipelines, and retrieval\-augmented generation (RAG) architectures is highly desirable.
Containerization \& Orchestration
- Experience implementing and managing containerized applications using:
- + Docker
+ Podman
+ Buildah
- Experience designing and maintaining orchestration platforms utilizing:
- + Kubernetes
+ OpenShift
+ Helm
DevSecOps \& CI/CD
- Experience developing and optimizing CI/CD pipelines using:
- + GitLab
+ Jenkins
+ AWS CodeBuild
- Strong understanding of automated testing, deployment, and release management processes.
Infrastructure as Code \& Automation
- Experience automating infrastructure provisioning and configuration management using:
- + Terraform
+ Ansible
+ AWS CloudFormation
- Experience implementing repeatable and scalable infrastructure solutions.
Linux Systems Administration
- Experience administering and supporting Linux\-based environments including:
- + Red Hat Enterprise Linux (RHEL)
+ CentOS
+ Ubuntu
Scripting \& Automation
- Experience creating automation tools and operational scripts using:
- + Bash
+ Python
+ PowerShell
Cloud Platforms
- Experience designing, deploying, and maintaining applications and infrastructure within:
- + Amazon Web Services (AWS)
+ Microsoft Azure
Software Development
- Experience developing full\-stack applications utilizing:
- + Java
+ Python
+ TypeScript
+ React
+ SQL
Agile \& Collaboration Tools
- Experience supporting Agile development teams using:
- + Jira
+ Confluence
+ Bitbucket
- Experience with source code control, documentation, and project management best practices.
Preferred Qualifications
- Experience supporting Department of Defense, Intelligence Community, or federal government programs.
- Experience implementing AI/ML capabilities in classified or secure environments.
- Cloud certifications (AWS, Azure).
- Kubernetes, OpenShift, Terraform, or DevSecOps certifications.
- Experience leading software development teams and technical modernization initiatives.
*Salary: $165\- 175k depending on experience*
Salary Context
This $165K-$175K range is below the median for AI/ML Engineer roles in our dataset (median: $180K across 1937 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 3,823 AI roles we're tracking, AI/ML Engineer positions make up 69% of the market. At G2IT, 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 $181,170 based on 12,692 positions with disclosed compensation. Senior-level AI roles across all categories have a median of $227,400. This role's midpoint ($170K) sits 6% below the category median. Disclosed range: $165K to $175K.
Across all AI roles, the market median is $200,100. Top-quartile compensation starts at $253,500. The 90th percentile reaches $307,500. For comparison, the highest-paying categories include AI Engineering Manager ($275,000) and AI Safety ($274,200). By seniority level: Entry: $97,880; Mid: $165,000; Senior: $227,400; Director: $247,800; VP: $250,000.
G2IT AI Hiring
G2IT has 1 open AI role right now. They're hiring across AI/ML Engineer. Based in San Diego, CA, US. Compensation range: $175K - $175K.
Location Context
Across all AI roles, 15% (590 positions) offer remote work, while 3,217 require on-site attendance. Top AI hiring metros: New York (2,643 roles, $211,000 median); San Francisco (2,168 roles, $253,000 median); Los Angeles (1,792 roles, $191,580 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 3,823 open positions tracked in our dataset. By seniority: 112 entry-level, 1,798 mid-level, 1,516 senior, and 397 leadership roles (Director, VP, C-Level). Remote roles make up 15% of the market (590 positions). The remaining 3,217 roles require on-site or hybrid attendance.
The market median for AI roles is $200,100. Top-quartile compensation starts at $253,500. The 90th percentile reaches $307,500. Highest-paying categories: AI Engineering Manager ($275,000 median, 41 roles); AI Safety ($274,200 median, 55 roles); Research Engineer ($260,000 median, 434 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 3,823 open positions across 15 role categories. The largest categories by volume: AI/ML Engineer (2,629), Data Scientist (322), AI Software Engineer (279). 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 (112) are outnumbered by mid-level (1,798) and senior (1,516) 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 397 positions, representing the bottleneck between technical execution and organizational strategy.
Remote work availability sits at 15% of all AI roles (590 positions), with 3,217 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 $200,100. Top-quartile roles start at $253,500, and the 90th percentile reaches $307,500. 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 Engineering Manager roles lead at $275,000 median, while Prompt Engineer roles sit at $140,000. 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 (1,979 postings), Aws (1,190 postings), Azure (899 postings), Rag (839 postings), Gcp (726 postings), Pytorch (595 postings), Prompt Engineering (595 postings), Claude (540 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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