Head of Developer Relations & Community – AI

$263K - $337K Menlo Park, CA, US Mid Level AI/ML Engineer

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Skills & Technologies

Hugging FaceLlamaPytorch

About This Role

AI job market dashboard showing open roles by category

Meta is seeking a senior technical leader to build and scale Developer Relations for our growing portfolio of AI solutions, including Muse API, Muse Code, Muse Spark models and future open\-weight releases. This person will define how the global developer community engages with, builds on, and extends Meta's open\-source model ecosystem and available tools, driving adoption from individual developers to enterprises to academic research institutions.You will own the end\-to\-end developer relationship strategy: growing a vibrant, self\-sustaining community around Meta's models; enabling developers to ship great products on top of our technology; and cultivating deep partnerships with academic institutions that advance the state of the art. This role sits at the intersection of engineering, product, and external engagement — and requires someone who can move fluidly between writing code, setting strategy, and delivering compelling presentations to large technical audiences.

### Head of Developer Relations \& Community – AI Responsibilities:

  • Define the vision and strategy for developer relations across Meta's closed and open\-source AI model portfolio (Muse Spark and future releases), ensuring a coherent developer experience as the portfolio grows
  • Build and grow a global developer community around Meta's models and solutions from grassroots meetups and hackathons to large\-scale programs that drive sustained engagement and contribution
  • Establish and deepen academic partnerships with leading research institutions worldwide, creating pathways for research collaboration, model adoption in curricula, and joint publications
  • Be a key external face of Meta's models in front of developers, keynoting at top\-tier conferences, engaging directly with influential developers and researchers, and representing Meta in the broader open\-source AI ecosystem
  • Drive developer adoption through technical enablement, reference architectures, sample applications, documentation, tutorials, and tooling that reduce time\-to\-value for developers building on our models
  • Own the developer feedback loop, capture signals from the community, distill insights, and route them back to Product and Engineering to shape model releases, APIs, and developer tooling
  • Define and execute metrics\-driven programs to grow active developers, contributors, and community engagement
  • report regularly on ecosystem health and adoption trajectory
  • Collaborate cross\-functionally with Product, Engineering, Research, Marketing, Partnerships, and Legal to align developer community efforts with Meta's broader open\-source strategy
  • Monitor the competitive and open\-source AI landscape, track how developers adopt and build on alternative models (open and closed), and steer Meta's ecosystem strategy to strengthen Meta's ecosystem position
  • Champion open\-source culture internally and externally, advocate for developer\-first decisions in model release processes, licensing, and tooling

### Minimum Qualifications:

  • Bachelor's degree in Computer Science, Computer Engineering, relevant technical field, or equivalent practical experience
  • 15\+ years in developer\-facing roles spanning DevRel, developer products, engineering, or technical leadership — with significant time spent in open\-source or AI/ML ecosystems
  • Deep technical credibility in AI/ML, large language models, or adjacent areas (model fine\-tuning, inference optimization, deployment, evaluation)
  • Demonstrated ability to build and scale developer communities from early stages to thousands of active contributors
  • Experience building relationships with academic and research institutions at a strategic level
  • Proven track record of operating at the executive level with metrics\-driven accountability (OKRs, ecosystem KPIs, adoption funnels)
  • Exceptional public communicator and written communicator with a strong presence in the AI developer community
  • Experience working cross\-functionally across engineering, product, marketing, partnerships, and policy

### Preferred Qualifications:

  • Experience adhering to and implementing responsible, ethical AI practices (e.g., risk assessment, bias mitigation, quality and accuracy reviews)
  • Demonstrated ongoing AI skill development (e.g., prompt/context engineering, agent orchestration) and staying current with emerging AI technologies
  • Publications, patents, or active open\-source contributions in AI/ML
  • Experience with multi\-modal AI models (vision, audio, code generation) and their developer workflows
  • Established networks across AI developer communities, open\-source foundations, and academic research groups
  • Familiarity with developer adoption dynamics in global markets — EMEA, Japan, Korea, India, Latin America
  • Demonstrated ability to integrate AI tools to optimize/redesign workflows and drive measurable impact (e.g., efficiency gains, quality improvements)
  • Direct experience with open\-source model ecosystems (Hugging Face, PyTorch, ONNX, LLAMA, or similar)
  • Prior experience at a major technology company leading community or ecosystem efforts at scale

### About Meta:

Meta builds technologies that help people connect, find communities, and grow businesses. When Facebook launched in 2004, it changed the way people connect. Apps like Messenger, Instagram and WhatsApp further empowered billions around the world. Now, Meta is moving beyond 2D screens toward immersive experiences like augmented and virtual reality to help build the next evolution in social technology. People who choose to build their careers by building with us at Meta help shape a future that will take us beyond what digital connection makes possible today—beyond the constraints of screens, the limits of distance, and even the rules of physics.

Meta is proud to be an Equal Employment Opportunity and Affirmative Action employer. We do not discriminate based upon race, religion, color, national origin, sex (including pregnancy, childbirth, or related medical conditions), sexual orientation, gender, gender identity, gender expression, transgender status, sexual stereotypes, age, status as a protected veteran, status as an individual with a disability, or other applicable legally protected characteristics. We also consider qualified applicants with criminal histories, consistent with applicable federal, state and local law. Meta participates in the E\-Verify program in certain locations, as required by law. Please note that Meta may leverage artificial intelligence and machine learning technologies in connection with applications for employment.

Meta is committed to providing reasonable accommodations for candidates with disabilities in our recruiting process. If you need any assistance or accommodations due to a disability, please let us know at accommodations\[email protected].

$263,000/year to $337,000/year \+ bonus \+ equity \+ benefits

Individual compensation is determined by skills, qualifications, experience, and location. Compensation details listed in this posting reflect the base hourly rate, monthly rate, or annual salary only, and do not include bonus, equity or sales incentives, if applicable. In addition to base compensation, Meta offers benefits. Learn more about benefits at Meta.

Salary Context

This $263K-$337K range is above the 75th percentile for AI/ML Engineer roles in our dataset (median: $175K across 2162 roles with salary data).

View full AI/ML Engineer salary data →

Role Details

Company Meta
Title Head of Developer Relations & Community – AI
Location Menlo Park, CA, US
Category AI/ML Engineer
Experience Mid Level
Salary $263K - $337K
Remote No

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 4,317 AI roles we're tracking, AI/ML Engineer positions make up 70% of the market. At Meta, 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

Hugging Face (3% of roles) Llama (2% of roles) Pytorch (15% of roles)

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 $214,900 based on 6,420 positions with disclosed compensation. Mid-level AI roles across all categories have a median of $194,400. This role's midpoint ($300K) sits 40% above the category median. Disclosed range: $263K to $337K.

Across all AI roles, the market median is $215,000. Top-quartile compensation starts at $266,300. The 90th percentile reaches $320,790. For comparison, the highest-paying categories include AI Safety ($287,500) and Research Engineer ($272,100). By seniority level: Entry: $110,000; Mid: $194,400; Senior: $227,400; Director: $274,554; VP: $241,000.

Meta AI Hiring

Meta has 40 open AI roles right now. They're hiring across AI Software Engineer, AI/ML Engineer, Research Scientist, AI Product Manager. Positions span Seattle, WA, US, Menlo Park, CA, US, New York, NY, US. Compensation range: $181K - $403K.

Location Context

Across all AI roles, 15% (635 positions) offer remote work, while 3,657 require on-site attendance. Top AI hiring metros: New York (1,650 roles, $220,000 median); San Francisco (1,335 roles, $265,000 median); Los Angeles (708 roles, $214,112 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 4,317 open positions tracked in our dataset. By seniority: 138 entry-level, 2,071 mid-level, 1,655 senior, and 453 leadership roles (Director, VP, C-Level). Remote roles make up 15% of the market (635 positions). The remaining 3,657 roles require on-site or hybrid attendance.

The market median for AI roles is $215,000. Top-quartile compensation starts at $266,300. The 90th percentile reaches $320,790. Highest-paying categories: AI Safety ($287,500 median, 34 roles); Research Engineer ($272,100 median, 227 roles); AI Engineering Manager ($244,000 median, 23 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 4,317 open positions across 15 role categories. The largest categories by volume: AI/ML Engineer (3,004), Data Scientist (345), AI Software Engineer (309). 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 (138) are outnumbered by mid-level (2,071) and senior (1,655) 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 453 positions, representing the bottleneck between technical execution and organizational strategy.

Remote work availability sits at 15% of all AI roles (635 positions), with 3,657 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 $215,000. Top-quartile roles start at $266,300, and the 90th percentile reaches $320,790. 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 $287,500 median, while Prompt Engineer roles sit at $145,000. 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 (2,249 postings), Aws (1,224 postings), Azure (938 postings), Rag (915 postings), Gcp (660 postings), Pytorch (640 postings), Prompt Engineering (624 postings), Kubernetes (559 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

Based on 6,420 roles with disclosed compensation, the median salary for AI/ML Engineer positions is $214,900. Actual compensation varies by seniority, location, and company stage.
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.
About 15% of the 4,317 AI roles we track offer remote work. Remote availability varies by company and seniority level, with senior and leadership roles more likely to offer location flexibility.
Meta is among the companies actively hiring for AI and ML talent. Check our company profiles for detailed breakdowns of open roles, salary ranges, and hiring trends.
Common next steps from AI/ML Engineer positions include ML Architect, AI Engineering Manager, Principal ML Engineer. Progression depends on whether you lean toward technical depth, people management, or product strategy.

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