Principal Applied AI Engineer
Appian
Principal Applied AI Engineer
Appian
Builds software that automates business processes
Here at Appian, our values of Intensity and Excellence define who we are. We set high standards and live up to them, ensuring that everything we do is done with care and quality. We approach every challenge with ambition and commitment, holding ourselves and each other accountable to achieve the best results. When you join Appian, you’ll be part of a passionate team dedicated to accomplishing hard things, together.
Principal Applied AI Engineer
Lead the engineering of software that matters — driving AI automation for the world's largest enterprises.
This role is based at our headquarters in McLean, Virginia. Appian was built on a culture of in-person collaboration, which we believe is a key driver of our mission to be the best. Employees hired for this position are expected to be in the office 5 days a week to foster that culture and ensure we continue to thrive through shared ideas and teamwork. We believe being in the office provides more opportunities to come together and celebrate working with the exceptional people across Appian.
ABOUT THE TEAM
Appian Engineering spans the full depth of our platform: from the foundational layers that power enterprise scale, to the AI capabilities redefining what automation can do. We operate in a highly collaborative, fast-paced environment focused on technical precision, continuous learning, and high code quality. By joining our team, you will solve real-world problems that directly shape how Appian delivers our AI-Powered Process Automation platform to enterprises around the world.
THE OPPORTUNITY
As a Principal Applied AI Engineer, you will serve as the technical linchpin for applied AI on the team, bringing deep hands-on expertise in designing and operating production LLM systems and a track record of influencing engineering direction beyond your immediate scope. Equipped with cutting-edge AI tooling, you will drive the design and delivery of high-complexity AI systems — spanning code generation, agents, retrieval, structured generation, tool use, model routing, evaluation, and observability — set the technical bar for the team, and lead other engineers towards solutions of real complexity to ensure flawless Enterprise-Grade Orchestration.
WHAT YOU'LL DO
Develop Clean Software: Architect, build, and optimize high-performance production LLM systems while maintaining a strong personal technical presence on the team.
Lead Platform Modernization: Spearhead strategic technological changes and champion code refactoring efforts to keep the core Appian codebase — and the AI systems built on it — cutting-edge, modern, and performant.
Engineer with AI: Use AI coding tools fluently as a force multiplier: generating, reviewing, and critically evaluating AI-assisted code to ship faster without compromising quality or correctness.
Lead Architecture & Delivery: Drive technical story breakdowns, acceptance criteria, and architectural design across complex, multi-tier and AI-powered application layers — from feature scoping through implementation. Build prototypes to de-risk novel AI approaches and establish the standards others build on.
Optimize Performance & Scale: Manage product availability, latency, scalability, and efficiency by engineering deep reliability into our core software systems and performing advanced system tuning.
Drive Engineering Excellence: Radiate development best practices across the department, perform meticulous code reviews on design and implementation, and build automation frameworks to prevent problem recurrence.
Lead & Grow Engineers: Actively coach and mentor engineers at multiple levels, identify and close skill gaps on the team, and take ownership of accelerating the technical growth of those around you.
Influence Technical Documentation: Share your expert domain knowledge regularly across the department, building a reputation as a vital resource and publishing high-quality content to Engineering’s permanent documentation site.
REQUIRED QUALIFICATIONS
Education: Minimum of a Bachelor of Science degree in Computer Science or a related technical/analytical discipline. (Equivalent experience is not accepted in lieu of a degree).
Experience: 10+ years of relevant software development experience with a BS (or 8+ years of experience paired with a Master of Science in Computer Science or related field).
Production LLM Systems: Deep hands-on experience designing and operating production LLM systems.
AI Systems Expertise: Demonstrated expertise across code generation, agents, retrieval, structured generation, tool use, model routing, evaluation, and observability.
AI-Augmented Development: Demonstrated experience using AI coding assistants and a strong ability to evaluate, coach others on, and selectively apply AI-generated code in a production engineering context.
Domain Expertise: Strong distributed-systems, API, security, and reliability foundations, with the ability to contribute meaningfully at a senior individual contributor level within that space.
Cross-Team Influence: Demonstrated ability to drive technical decisions and shape engineering practices beyond a single team or project scope.
Production Mastery: Proven experience developing, optimizing, and maintaining a high-volume, mission-critical production service environment.
Communication & Alignment: Exceptional ability to communicate highly technical architectures verbally, visually, and in writing to diverse engineering audiences.
PREFERRED QUALIFICATIONS
Compilers & Program Analysis: Experience with compilers, program analysis, formal or executable specifications, or legacy modernization is strongly preferred.
We value experience with enterprise platforms such as Salesforce or ServiceNow, as these skills translate well into our Enterprise-Grade Orchestration environment.
The base salary range represents a good faith and reasonable estimate of the range at the time of posting. Actual compensation will be dependent on a number of factors including, but not limited to, the candidate’s relevant work experience, qualifications, internal peer equity, and market and business conditions that exist when extending an offer. A discretionary bonus may be awarded in recognition of individual and company performance.
In addition, Appian provides generous benefits offerings that include a 401(k) plan with company match, flexible time off, paid parental leave, medical, dental, and vision plans, life insurance, disability insurance, wellness programs, flexible spending accounts, health savings account contributions, an employee referral bonus program, and learning and development resources. Certain positions may be eligible for equity awards.
Pay and benefits are subject to change at any time, consistent with the terms of any applicable compensation, commission, bonus, or benefit plans.
Tools and Resources
Benefits
Appian offers a comprehensive benefits package designed to support your health, wellbeing, and financial future. Benefits may include health coverage, Employee Assistance Program (EAP) with free mental health support, life and disability insurance, an Employee Stock Purchase Program (ESPP), a retirement/pension plan, wellness dollars, tuition reimbursement, family-forming benefits and more. Benefits vary by country—please ask your Talent Acquisition contact for details specific to the location you are applying to.
About Appian
Appian provides AI automation for the most important business processes at the world’s largest organizations. Our platform is known for its unique power, reliability, and scale. We’ve been automating processes for more than 25 years and have proven expertise in enterprise operations. For more information, visit appian.com.
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Appian is an equal opportunity employer that strives to attract and retain the best talent. All qualified applicants will receive consideration for employment without regard to any characteristic protected by applicable federal, state, or local law.
Appian provides reasonable accommodations to applicants in accordance with all applicable laws. If you need a reasonable accommodation for any part of the employment process, please contact us by email at [email protected]. Please note that only inquiries concerning a request for reasonable accommodation will be responded to from this email address.
Base Salary Range 200000 - 350000 USD
Appian builds software that banks, insurers, government agencies and other heavily regulated organizations use to automate complex work, such as onboarding clients, settling claims and reviewing grant applications. In 2001, it built Army Knowledge Online, a web portal for US Army personnel that was then considered the world's largest intranet. Customers' developers build apps by connecting visual building blocks instead of writing much code, while a data fabric links records across their existing systems without migrating them and AI agents read documents and handle routine steps. Customers pay subscription fees, mostly for software that Appian runs in its own cloud. Appian was founded in 1999 and is based in McLean, Virginia.
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