Senior AI Engineer

Cornerstone OnDemand is seeking a Senior AI Engineer to build AI-native products within our Workforce AI product line. This role is designed for an engineer who builds systems with artificial intelligence at the core, not as an add-on—owning architecture, prompt engineering, model integration, and production-scale delivery.

You will work closely with Product, UX, and Platform Engineering teams to deliver scalable, trustworthy AI capabilities that power Cornerstone’s workforce intelligence solutions.

In this role, you will...

AI-Native Product Development

• Design and implement AI-first architectures, where machine learning and generative AI are foundational system components.
• Build and productionize ML and Generative AI workflows, including prompt engineering, retrieval-augmented generation (RAG), evaluation, and iteration.
• Develop end-to-end AI features, from data ingestion and feature engineering to inference and feedback loops.
• Partner with Product and UX teams to shape AI-driven user experiences, ensuring usability, explainability, and trust.

Prompt Engineering & Optimization

• Design, develop, and optimize prompt strategies for large language models to ensure accuracy, consistency, and relevance in production use cases.
• Implement prompt versioning, experimentation, and A/B testing to support rapid iteration and data-driven improvements.
• Continuously evaluate and refine prompts using offline evaluation, automated testing, and live telemetry to reduce hallucinations and improve output quality.
• Optimize prompt and model usage to balance response quality, latency, and cost efficiency at scale.
• Collaborate with UX and Product to align prompt behavior with user intent, tone, and experience expectations.

Engineering & Platform Excellence

• Develop scalable backend services using Java and/or Python, deployed in AWS cloud environments.
• Design and optimize API-driven architectures that integrate AI services securely and reliably across the platform.
• Work with SQL and NoSQL databases to support transactional and analytical workloads.
• Apply strong engineering fundamentals around performance, reliability, observability, and security.
• Contribute to architectural decisions that ensure long-term scalability and maintainability.

Leadership & Collaboration

• Provide technical leadership in AI and system design discussions.
• Mentor engineers and help raise the overall AI and engineering maturity of the team.
• Collaborate cross-functionally with Data Science, Platform, UX, DevOps, and Security teams.
• Influence technical roadmaps and align AI capabilities with Workforce AI product goals.

You have what it takes if you have

• 8–10 years of professional software engineering experience.
• Strong hands-on experience with Java and/or Python.
• Proven experience delivering AI/ML or Generative AI systems in production.
• Hands-on expertise in prompt engineering and prompt optimization for LLM-powered applications.
• Solid experience with AWS and cloud-native system design.
• Strong working knowledge of SQL and NoSQL databases.
• Ability to design systems that balance AI quality, scalability, latency, and cost.

Extra dose of awesome if you have...

• Experience with LLMs, RAG architectures, vector databases, and structured output enforcement.
• Familiarity with MLOps practices (model versioning, monitoring, evaluation).
• Experience designing AI-powered user experiences in partnership with UX teams.
• Background in enterprise SaaS or workforce/HR technology.
• Experience taking AI products from concept to production.

Our Culture:

Spark Greatness. Shatter Boundaries. Share Success. Are you ready? Because here, right now – is where the future of work is happening. Where curious disruptors and change innovators like you are helping communities and customers enable everyone – anywhere – to learn, grow and advance. To be better tomorrow than they are today.

Who We Are:

Cornerstone powers the potential of organizations and their people to thrive in a changing world. Cornerstone Galaxy, the complete AI-powered workforce agility platform, meets organizations where they are. With Galaxy, organizations can identify skills gaps and development opportunities, retain and engage top talent, and provide multimodal learning experiences to meet the diverse needs of the modern workforce. More than 7,000 organizations and 100 million+ users in 180+ countries and in nearly 50 languages use Cornerstone Galaxy to build high-performing, future-ready organizations and people today.

Total Rewards:

At Cornerstone, we are dedicated to inspiring excellence and pushing boundaries in everything we do. Our compensation strategy is based on three fundamental principles: equitable pay, market-driven research, and skill-based appraisals. As part of our mission to share success and empower individuals to thrive in an ever-changing world, the listed salary range is just one element of Cornerstone’s comprehensive compensation package. This compensation package may also include annual bonuses, short- and program-specific awards depending on the role, and a comprehensive benefit offering. The disclosed salary range reflects the geographic differential based on the location of the position if applicable. The starting salary for the successful applicant will depend on several job-related factors, including education, training, experience, certifications, location, business needs, and market demands. This range is based on a full-time position and may be adjusted in the future. Join us in shaping the future of work — tomorrow, together. Experience flexibility and empowerment in your career at Cornerstone. The BASE salary range for this position is: 137100 - 219400 USD.

Check us out on LinkedIn, Comparably, Glassdoor, and Facebook!

Equal Employment Opportunity has been, and will continue to be, a fundamental commitment at Cornerstone OnDemand. All qualified applicants are given consideration regardless of race, religion, color, gender, sex, age, sexual orientation, gender identity, national origin, marital status, citizenship status, disability, veteran status, or any other protected class as provided in applicable Federal, State, or Local fair employment laws. If you have a disability or special need that requires accommodation, please contact us at careers@csod.com or +1 855 454 8433.

Read the EEO is the Law poster here, and the supplementary poster here

Read the Read the Pay Transparency Nondiscrimination Provision poster here