Associate AI Engineer

About Figure Figure (NASDAQ: FIGR) is transforming capital markets through blockchain. We’re proving that blockchain isn’t just theory - it’s powering real products used by hundreds of thousands of consumers and institutions. By combining blockchain’s transparency and efficiency with AI-driven automation, we’ve reimagined how loans are originated, funded, and traded in secondary markets. From faster processing times to lower costs and reduced bias, our technology is helping borrowers, investors, and financial institutions achieve better outcomes. Together with our 170+ partners, we’ve originated over $22 billion in home equity loans (HELOCs) on our blockchain-native platform, making Figure the largest non-bank provider of home equity financing in the U.S. Figure’s ecosystem also includes YLDS, an SEC-registered yield-bearing stablecoin that operates as a tokenized money market fund, and several other products and platforms that are reshaping consumer finance and capital markets. We’re proud to be recognized as one of Forbes’ Most Innovative Fintech Startups in 2025 and Fast Company’s Most Innovative Companies in Finance and Personal Finance. About The Role Figure's AI Engineering team builds and operates production AI systems that improve operational efficiency, customer experience, risk management, and decision quality. We're hiring an Associate AI Engineer to help operate and improve our conversational AI systems while developing into a full-stack AI engineer. Initially, approximately half of your work will focus on the technical operation of AI-powered chat, voice, and customer-support services. You will bring engineering rigor to agent workflows, API integrations, testing, analytics, knowledge retrieval, security, and production releases. The other half will consist of hands-on projects across our broader AI stack. With coaching from senior engineers, you will build Python services, APIs, data pipelines, evaluations, and internal tools supporting production AI systems. This role is well suited to someone who combines analytical depth with practical programming ability. You may come from software engineering, economics, another quantitative social science, data science, or a similarly rigorous field. We care more about demonstrated reasoning and engineering ability than a particular degree or conventional career path. This is not a content-management or prompt-writing position. You will help operate conversational AI as production software: tested, measurable, secure, observable, and carefully governed. What You'll Work On Conversational AI Systems Improve AI-powered chat and voice services supporting customer-service and lending workflowsBuild and maintain agent workflows, API-integrated tools, guardrails, retrieval rules, and escalation pathsReview workflows for logic errors, unsafe behavior, routing conflicts, and unnecessary model contextEstablish disciplined development, staging, testing, review, and production-release practicesPartner with domain experts who own customer experience, policies, and lending operationsTranslate business knowledge into reliable system behavior without becoming the sole owner of that knowledgeDetermine whether problems are best solved through workflow logic, deterministic code, retrieval, an LLM, or a product change Evaluation and Analytics Build automated tests and simulations for conversational workflowsDefine and measure containment, escalation, answer quality, task completion, and customer-impact metricsDevelop tagging, monitoring, and quality-assurance systems for production conversationsAnalyze failures and turn production evidence into prioritized improvementsBuild pipelines that make conversational data available to analytics and reporting systemsDesign controlled experiments and incremental rollouts that measure business outcomes Full-Stack AI Engineering Build Python services and APIs that expose AI capabilitiesDevelop integrations between AI systems and Figure's internal servicesBuild data and evaluation pipelines using Python and SQLContribute to internal tools and user interfacesLearn Figure's deployment, monitoring, containerization, and CI/CD practicesGradually own increasingly substantial production engineering projects Security and Governance Inventory and review conversational tools that access internal or third-party APIsEnsure sensitive operations use deterministic validation instead of unreliable model judgmentSupport appropriate handling of customer data, credentials, PII, and regulated workflowsMaintain auditability for workflow changes and production behaviorEscalate security, compliance, and reliability concerns using sound technical reasoning What We're Looking For Must-Haves Strong programming fundamentals and practical Python experienceWorking knowledge of SQL and structured data analysisAbility to break ambiguous problems into testable componentsComfort reading unfamiliar code and tracing system behaviorStrong written communication and attention to detailInterest in AI behavior, analytics, backend systems, and product workflowsA habit of validating assumptions and measuring outcomesAbility to collaborate with engineers and nontechnical domain expertsDesire to grow into a full-stack production AI engineer Strong Signals Experience building an API, backend service, automation, data pipeline, or internal toolExperience evaluating LLMs, conversational agents, or other probabilistic systemsKnowledge of experimental design, statistics, causal inference, or applied econometricsExperience testing nondeterministic systemsFamiliarity with retrieval-augmented generation, agent tools, workflow engines, or model evaluationAbility to distinguish problems requiring deterministic logic from those suited to an LLMExperience translating domain or policy requirements into software behavior Nice-to-Haves Degree or research background in economics, computer science, statistics, engineering, or another quantitative disciplineGraduate training involving empirical research and substantial programmingExperience with TypeScript or a modern frontend frameworkFamiliarity with cloud platforms, Docker, CI/CD, or infrastructure as codeExperience with experimentation systems, analytics platforms, or business-intelligence toolsExperience in lending, fintech, healthcare, or another regulated environmentExperience with customer-support or contact-center systems A PhD is welcome but not required. Candidates with unconventional backgrounds are encouraged to apply if they demonstrate strong analytical reasoning and practical software-building ability. What We're Not Looking For Candidates interested only in prompt writing or content administrationPure researchers who do not want to build and operate production systemsEngineers unwilling to collaborate closely with domain expertsCandidates who accept model outputs without evaluationPeople who default to an LLM when deterministic code or a product change would be saferCandidates seeking a narrowly defined role without operational responsibility What Success Looks Like Within your first six months, you will: Understand Figure's conversational AI workflows and integrationsStrengthen testing, monitoring, security, and release disciplineResolve concrete workflow reliability issuesProduce defensible reporting on conversational-system performanceShip at least one production integration, service, or internal toolDemonstrate increasing independence across Python, APIs, data, evaluation, and deployment Over time, the role will shift toward broader full-stack AI engineering as the conversational systems become better governed and operational responsibilities become more distributed. Salary Base Compensation Range: 80K - 120K annually 25% annual bonus target, paid quarterly Company equity in the form of RSUs This is the compensation range for the role in the United States. Actual compensation may vary based on a candidate’s experience, skills, location, internal equity, and evolving business needs. While most offers are generally made within the middle of the range, final compensation is determined based on the factors above. Benefits Comprehensive medical, dental, and vision coverage, with 100% employer-paid premiums for employees and their dependents on select plans Company HSA, FSA, Dependent Care FSA, 401(k), and commuter benefits Employer-paid life and disability insurance 11 observed holidays and PTO plan Up to 12 weeks of paid family leave Continuing education reimbursement Depending on your residential location certain laws might regulate the way Figure manages applicant data. California Residents, please review our California Employee and General Workforce Privacy Notice for further information. By submitting your application, you are agreeing and acknowledging that you have read and understand the above notice. Figure will not sponsor work visas for this position. In compliance with federal law, all persons hired will be required to verify identity and eligibility to work in the United States and to complete the required employment eligibility verification form upon hire.