Staff AI Engineer

About the role

Workato is building infrastructure for the agentic era, focusing on unifying data, applications, and AI within a governed platform. This role involves designing and maintaining production-grade systems that support intelligent automation and large-scale retrieval services. You will work closely with platform and product teams to integrate advanced AI capabilities into the company ecosystem. The position requires ownership of core infrastructure that powers AI-driven workflows across the organization. You will be responsible for translating high-level product requirements into robust, scalable technical solutions. This role sits at the intersection of backend engineering and artificial intelligence, shaping how models are deployed and utilized in production. Your work will directly influence the performance and reliability of enterprise automation tools.

Key facts

What you'll do

• Develop and maintain AI-powered APIs and services using LLMs such as OpenAI, Anthropic, Qwen, and open-source models.
• Create an enterprise-grade agentic framework to support orchestration and collaboration between AI agents.
• Optimize knowledge retrieval and agentic search functionality using vector databases like Qdrant and ElasticSearch.
• Write testable, efficient Python code for production services and internal tooling.
• Build shared Python libraries and SDKs for use across multiple microservices.
• Define architecture, internal protocols, and API standards in collaboration with cross-functional teams.
• Implement observability, validation, and monitoring for AI solutions in production.
• Manage the entire software development lifecycle, from initial design to deployment and scaling.
• Troubleshoot performance and reliability issues within data-intensive environments.
• Mentor engineering staff and contribute to technical reviews.

Requirements

• Bachelor's or Master's degree in Computer Science, Engineering, or a related field, or equivalent practical experience.
• Minimum of 5 years of professional experience as a Software Engineer with high proficiency in Python.
• Demonstrated success in building and maintaining production-level systems.
• Deep understanding of API design, distributed systems, and data-driven architecture.
• Experience with relational and non-relational databases, including PostgreSQL, ElasticSearch, or Qdrant.
• Familiarity with AI and ML system design, specifically regarding LLM integration and evaluation pipelines.
• Knowledge of DevOps practices, including CI/CD, metrics, monitoring, and model validation.

Nice to have

• Experience working with multiple LLM providers and open-source models.
• Background in AI infrastructure or developer platform engineering.
• Familiarity with knowledge graph architectures, semantic retrieval, and vector databases.
• Practical experience with frameworks such as Langfuse, LiteLLM, or LangChain.
• History of developing distributed backend systems or enterprise-scale SaaS.
• Contributions to open-source projects related to infrastructure or Python.

Practical notes

• REQ ID: 2460.
• Workato emphasizes a trust-oriented culture with a focus on balancing productivity and self-care.

This Staff AI Engineer position represents a significant opportunity to contribute to the foundational systems that enable scalable AI automation. The role demands a strong sense of ownership over the entire stack, from low-level service implementation to high-level architectural decisions. You will be expected to write clean, maintainable code while also establishing best practices for AI engineering within the organization. Collaboration is a core component of the position, requiring close coordination with product managers, designers, and other engineers to ensure alignment between technical capabilities and business objectives. The ideal candidate is comfortable operating in a fast-paced environment where requirements evolve and technical challenges are complex.

Success in this role will be measured by the reliability and performance of the systems you build. You will need to balance innovation with operational stability, ensuring that new AI features can be deployed safely at scale. The position requires a deep commitment to software craftsmanship and a willingness to share knowledge across the team. You will participate in technical discussions, design reviews, and code audits to maintain high standards across the codebase. The role also involves debugging intricate issues that span multiple services and data layers. This is not just about writing code, but about building a sustainable engineering culture around AI.

The compensation details are not specified in the source material, but the engagement type is clearly defined as full-time. Candidates should be prepared to relocate to one of the specified German cities, as the role is tied to specific office locations. The technical stack is clearly outlined, requiring proficiency in Python and familiarity with modern AI tooling. Experience with cloud-native technologies such as Kubernetes is implied through the requirements for production-grade systems. The position is listed under REQ ID 2460, which should be referenced in all communications regarding this role.