Sr AI Engineer I

American Express is seeking a Sr AI Engineer I based in Phoenix, AZ (onsite) to help build agentic AI systems and platforms designed to run responsibly and at scale within financial services. The role centers on engineering intelligent solutions for complex workflows, with clear attention to security, reliability, and compliance.

Key Responsibilities

• Collaborate with product, design, and business stakeholders to deliver agentic capabilities that reduce operational friction, support improved decision-making, and enhance how customers interact, transact, and grow.
• Design agentic AI systems that are intelligent and adaptive, with the ability to plan, reason, and act across complex workflows while matching appropriate autonomy levels.
• Develop systems that enable autonomous workflows, decision support, and customer-facing experiences, meeting high expectations for security, explainability, reliability, and compliance in a regulated financial context.

Required Qualifications

• 6+ years of software engineering experience, including meaningful production experience using LLMs or applied ML systems.
• Proven track record shipping AI-powered or agentic systems used by real customers or users.
• Strong engineering fundamentals across backend systems, APIs, data pipelines, and cloud infrastructure.
• Hands-on experience with modern LLM tooling and agentic patterns and architectures.
• Fluency with AI-assisted and agentic development workflows.
• Sound ownership and technical judgment.
• Ability to work effectively in ambiguous situations and turn that uncertainty into shipped, reliable product outcomes.
• Strong product mindset and customer orientation.
• Experience building agentic systems in fintech or other regulated industries.
• Experience as a founding engineer or early technical contributor in high-growth environments.
• Demonstrated ability to ship technically complex systems within regulated contexts that customers actively rely on.
• Meaningful open-source contributions, particularly in AI or developer tooling.

Preferred Qualifications

• Additional experience building agentic systems in fintech or other regulated industries.
• Experience as a founding engineer or early technical contributor in high-growth environments.
• Demonstrated ability to ship technically complex systems in regulated contexts that customers actively rely on.
• Meaningful open-source contributions, particularly in AI or developer tooling.

Role Location and Compensation

• Location: Phoenix, AZ (onsite)
• Compensation: USD 123,000 - 215,250 per year