Distinguished, Software Engineer - Generative AI & Assistants

Position Summary

The Conversational AI team at Walmart builds and deploys core AI assistant experiences across Walmart. The team owns the main "shopping assistant" for the largest retailer in the country and builds the core AI platform for the largest private workforce. With tens of millions of active users across multiple countries, these are among the largest vertical AI assistant experiences in the industry.

We are looking for a Distinguished Engineer to lead the next evolution of the AI assistant platform by defining and building highly scalable Generative AI systems and infrastructure. This will be a hands-on technical leadership role which requires expertise at the intersection of large-scale distributed systems, machine learning, LLMs, and more. Our AI assistants are rapidly incorporating LLMs and agent-based architecture with custom fine-tuned models.

What You'll Do

In this role, as a technical lead you will own the technical architecture and roadmap for the Conversational AI platform and Shopping Assistant. The list of responsibilities include:

1. Define the AI assistant architecture leveraging generative AI in a rapidly evolving ecosystem.
2. Partner with multiple teams as the senior platform architect and evangelize the architecture, enable integrations, and support development of new AI assistants.
3. Stay up-to-date on industry trends in the latest generative AI and AI assistant architecture patterns (e.g., agent chaining, COT, RAG, LLM guardrails, etc.).
4. Work with applied scientists, ML engineers, software engineers, and product managers to develop the next generation of AI assistant experiences.
5. Be a thought leader of new GenAI capabilities, build prototypes to showcase applications, and evangelize with senior leaders and business partners.
6. Benchmark industry against internal processes and solutions, defining software development guidelines, standards, and processes, sponsoring, developing, and influencing continuous improvement initiatives and experiments with innovative technologies, evaluating and negotiating with external vendors and services.
7. Oversee large-scale, complex, cross-functional projects by translating strategies and requirements into technical solutions.
8. Review and improve the team's operational excellence posture and identify improvements in engineering processes.
9. Partner closely with engineering directors and managers to recruit, develop, and retain the team’s engineering staff or experts in the owned cross-cutting area.

What You'll Bring

1. Extensive experience in the design, development, and delivery of software products with a large customer base, preferably in Conversational AI or machine learning-based systems.
2. Deep and demonstrated personal interest in the generative AI space, including awareness of the latest architectural advancements in building generative AI applications.
3. Strong track record in an architect role with large-scale software development data-backed services and applications.
4. A clear vision for architecture design and great communication skills to articulate that to all levels of stakeholders.
5. Excellent decision-making skills with the ability to balance conflicting interests in a complex and fast-paced environment.
6. Thorough understanding of distributed technologies, public cloud technologies, scalable platforms, ML platforms, and Operational Excellence.
7. Experience working with geographically distributed teams.
8. Business acumen; combining technical vision with business insights.

Minimum Qualifications

Outlined below are the required minimum qualifications for this position:

1. Option 1: Bachelor's degree in computer science, computer engineering, computer information systems, software engineering, or related area and 6 years' experience in software engineering or related area.
2. Option 2: 8 years' experience in software engineering or related area.

Preferred Qualifications

Outlined below are the optional preferred qualifications for this position:

1. Master's degree in computer science, computer engineering, computer information systems, software engineering, or related area and 4 years' experience in software engineering or related area.
2. Knowledge in creating inclusive digital experiences, demonstrating knowledge in implementing Web Content Accessibility Guidelines (WCAG) 2.2 AA standards, assistive technologies, and integrating digital accessibility seamlessly.

Location

640 W California Avenue, Sunnyvale, CA 94086-4828, United States of America