This role is designed for a seasoned engineering leader who thrives at the intersection of platform architecture and Large Language Models. You’ll need a "build
Work type: remote
Location: NAMER | EMEA
Salary: $274,800 – $412,200/yr
Type: Full-time
This role is designed for a seasoned engineering leader who thrives at the intersection of platform architecture and Large Language Models. You’ll need a "builder-first" mentality and roughly 10+ years of high-scale engineering experience, including at least 2 years of deep, hands-on work with LLMs, RAG systems, and agentic architectures in production. This isn't just an advisory role; you will be the primary architect unifying the AI execution platform that powers millions of automated workflows. Zapier offers a premier remote-first environment, though this specific position requires working Eastern Time hours at least three days a week to sync with North American stakeholders. The standout appeal of this role is the high leverage—you are building the foundational infrastructure that every other AI product team at the company will use, giving you massive visibility and influence over how intelligent automation evolves. **You might be a good fit if you...** * Have successfully deployed complex, user-facing LLM systems and understand the nuances of evaluation frameworks and vector databases. * Excel at navigating high-scale, ambiguous environments and can balance "scrappy" innovation with pragmatic, production-ready standards. * Want to move beyond building individual AI features to architecting the core engine that powers a global automation ecosystem. * Are a skilled communicator who can pair-program with engineers one hour and lead cross-functional strategy with product leaders the next.
## AI at Zapier
At [Zapier](https://zapier.com/about), we build and use automation every day to make work more efficient, creative, and human. So if you’re using AI tools while applying here - that’s great! We just ask that you use them responsibly and transparently.
Check out our guidance on [How to Collaborate with AI During Zapier’s Hiring Process](https://zapier.com/l/jobs/ai-at-zapier), including how to use AI tools like ChatGPT, Claude, Gemini, or others during our hiring process - and when not to.
## About Zapier
We're humans who simply think computers should do more work.
At [Zapier](https://zapier.com/about), we’re building a platform to help millions of businesses scale with[automation and AI](https://zapier.com/ai). Our mission is simple: make automation work for everyone. As a member of the team, you’ll collaborate with intelligent, curious people, build and apply cutting-edge tools, and leverage the flexibility of remote work. Your work will directly fuel [our customers](https://zapier.com/customer-stories)’ success, and as they grow, so will you.
## About The Role
Zapier is hiring a Staff Applied AI Engineer for our AI Capabilities team, the group responsible for building the shared AI execution platform that powers every AI product at Zapier, including Agents, Chatbots, AI by Zapier, and future orchestration experiences.
This is one of the most foundational engineering roles at Zapier today.
AI Capabilities is unifying the runtimes, tooling, data models, and orchestration layers behind our AI products into a single, reliable, high-quality platform with great ergonomics. We’re building what Zapier’s AI foundation should have been from day one—and we’re delivering it in a way that accelerates all other AI teams.
As the Staff Applied AI Engineer on this team, you’ll bring deep technical expertise in LLMs, orchestration, evaluation, runtime systems, and platform engineering. You’ll help shape our unified architecture, guide tough tradeoffs, elevate our engineering standards, and ensure the platform is scalable, safe, cost-efficient, and easy to build on.
If you want to work on hard AI platform problems that directly impact user-facing products—and you’re energized by building the foundation that other AI-focused teams and millions of users will rely on—you’ll thrive here.
## Why this is different (and exciting)
This is a rare opportunity to help build the AI platform behind one of the world’s largest automation ecosystems. The AI Capabilities team empowers every runtime AI product at Zapier; Agents, Chatbots, AI by Zapier, and the orchestration surfaces yet to come.
You’ll work on challenges that matter: making AI reliable, fast, safe, cost-efficient, and easy to build on. Your work will enable product teams to ship smarter features faster, and you’ll see your impact reflected directly in the experiences our customers use to run their businesses.
If you’re excited about high-leverage engineering work that blends platform design, system architecture, and applied AI, this role gives you a front-row seat to shape how intelligent automation gets built at scale.
## About You
## Things You’ll Do
This role is open to candidates globally. Because the majority of our stakeholders, partner teams, and decision-makers are based in North America, this role requires working standard Eastern Time (ET) hours at least three days per week to support real-time collaboration, technical reviews, and cross-functional decision-making.
Outside of those days, you may set your own working hours, provided they support the needs of your team and comply with local labor regulations. We're committed to ensuring this schedule is sustainable and will partner with you during the hiring process to assess feasibility based on your location.
## How to Apply
At Zapier, we believe that diverse perspectives and experiences make us better, which is why we have a non-standard application process designed to promote inclusion and equity. We're looking for the best fit for each of our roles, regardless of the type of companies in your background, so we encourage you to apply even if your skills and experiences don’t exactly match the job description. All we ask is that you answer a few in-depth questions in our application that would typically be asked at the start of an interview process. This helps speed things up by letting us get to know you and your skillset a bit better right out of the gate. Please be sure to answer each question; the resume and CV fields are optional.
Education is not a requirement for our roles; however, if you receive an offer, you will need to include your most recent educational experience as part of our background check process.
After you apply, you are going to hear back from us—even if we don’t see an immediate fit with our team. In fact, throughout the process, we strive to never go more than seven days without letting you know the status of your application. We know we’ll make mistakes from time to time, so if you ever have questions about where you stand or about the process, just ask your recruiter!