Company Description

At Red Hat, we connect an innovative community of customers, partners, and contributors to deliver an open source stack of trusted, high-performing solutions. We offer cloud, Linux, middleware, virtualization, and AI technologies, together with award-winning global customer support, consulting, and implementation services. Red Hat is a rapidly-growing company supporting more than 90% of Fortune 500 companies.

Job Summary

Red Hat's Global Engineering Team is looking for a Principal Software Engineer to join our newly formed AI Engineering organization. This role will be located within the InstructLab and Granite team, and will be focused on Retrieval-Augmented Generation (RAG) systems and generative AI model evaluation, as well as mentorship and building of these skills internal to our Red Hat team. 

In this role, you will serve as a bridge between Red Hat and our peer IBM Research team – this will involve participating in the development of novel techniques and research extensions alongside IBM Research. This role also requires engaging with RAG and evaluation upstream open source communities and projects. You will develop working relationships across multiple teams, planning and prioritizing sprint work across a small team, along with direct contribution to development projects at a senior level of ability.

The ideal candidate will be a highly collaborative individual with a passion for working on complex projects in an open organization where contributions are valued and expected from all levels. As this is a fast-moving area of opportunity for Red Hat, the ability to communicate productively and effectively with team members, stakeholders, and Red Hat leadership is critical.

This position reports directly to the Manager of Software Engineering for InstructLab. This position may require occasional travel to partner collaboratively in our Boston, MA office multiple times per quarter. Successful applicants must reside in a state where Red Hat is registered to do business.

Primary Job Responsibilities (what you’ll do)

• Design, implement, and optimize RAG systems to improve the quality and relevance of generated content.

• Develop retrieval mechanisms to efficiently access and leverage external data sources.

• Train and fine-tune generative models with retrieved data to enhance performance and accuracy.

• Evaluate model performance and iterate on improvements based on metrics and user feedback.

• Work closely with data scientists, product managers, and other stakeholders to understand requirements and deliver effective solutions.

• Participate in code reviews and collaborate on best practices within the engineering team.

• Stay up-to-date with the latest advancements in AI, natural language processing (NLP), and RAG methodologies.

• Participate in upstream RAG and generative AI model evaluation projects such as lm-eval, ragas.io, LlamaIndex, LangChain, etc.

• Explore new techniques and tools that can enhance the retrieval and generation capabilities, including document and other media data ingestion into RAG and model training workflows

• Document system designs, processes, and model performance for transparency and future reference.

• Report on project status, challenges, and results to stakeholders.

• Serve as a subject matter expert on RAG systems and eval for the RHEL AI team, providing mentorship and expertise to build knowledge and capabilities within Red Hat teams. 

• Gather and analyze user feedback to refine and enhance RAG systems.

Required Skills (what you’ll bring)

• Bachelor's degree in computer science or equivalent.

• Advanced programming skills in Python and SQL.

• Proficiency in machine learning frameworks (e.g., TensorFlow, PyTorch).

• Understanding of natural language processing (NLP) techniques and models.

• Familiarity with retrieval-augmented generation architectures and methodologies.

• Knowledge of how to integrate retrieval mechanisms with generative models.

• Experience with data processing and manipulation libraries.

• Knowledge of microservices and containerization technologies (e.g., Kubernetes) for LLM deployment.

• Strong self-motivation and organizational skills.

• Demonstrated ability to context switch between multiple concurrent projects.

• Excellent written and verbal communication skills.

• Positive attitude and willingness to share ideas openly.

Bonus qualifications

• Masters or PhD in Machine Learning (ML) / Natural Language Processing (NLP).

• Experience with unit testing, integration testing, and performance testing.

• Familiarity with participating in an agile development team.

The salary range for this position is $170,600.00 - $281,370.00. Actual offer will be based on your qualifications.

Pay Transparency

Red Hat determines compensation based on several factors including but not limited to job location, experience, applicable skills and training, external market value, and internal pay equity. Annual salary is one component of Red Hat’s compensation package. This position may also be eligible for bonus, commission, and/or equity. For positions with Remote-US locations, the actual salary range for the position may differ based on location but will be commensurate with job duties and relevant work experience. 

About Red Hat

Red Hat is the world’s leading provider of enterprise open source software solutions, using a community-powered approach to deliver high-performing Linux, cloud, container, and Kubernetes technologies. Spread across 40+ countries, our associates have the flexibility to choose the work environment that suits their needs from in-office to fully remote to office-flex. Red Hatters are encouraged to bring their best ideas, no matter their title or tenure. We're a leader in open source because of our open and inclusive environment. We hire creative, passionate people ready to contribute their ideas, help solve complex problems, and make an impact. Opportunities are open. Join us.

Benefits
●    Comprehensive medical, dental, and vision coverage
●    Flexible Spending Account - healthcare and dependent care
●    Health Savings Account - high deductible medical plan
●    Retirement 401(k) with employer match
●    Paid time off and holidays
●    Paid parental leave plans for all new parents
●    Leave benefits including disability, paid family medical leave, and paid military leave
●    Additional benefits including employee stock purchase plan, family planning reimbursement, tuition reimbursement, transportation expense account, employee assistance program, and more! 

Note: These benefits are only applicable to full time, permanent associates at Red Hat located in the United States. 

Diversity, Equity & Inclusion at Red Hat
Red Hat’s culture is built on the open source principles of transparency, collaboration, and inclusion, where the best ideas can come from anywhere and anyone. When this is realized, it empowers people from diverse backgrounds, perspectives, and experiences to come together to share ideas, challenge the status quo, and drive innovation. Our aspiration is that everyone experiences this culture with equal opportunity and access, and that all voices are not only heard but also celebrated. We hope you will join our celebration, and we welcome and encourage applicants from all the beautiful dimensions of diversity that compose our global village.

Equal Opportunity Policy (EEO)
Red Hat is proud to be an equal opportunity workplace and an affirmative action employer. We review applications for employment without regard to their race, color, religion, sex, sexual orientation, gender identity, national origin, ancestry, citizenship, age, veteran status, genetic information, physical or mental disability, medical condition, marital status, or any other basis prohibited by law.

Red Hat does not seek or accept unsolicited resumes or CVs from recruitment agencies. We are not responsible for, and will not pay, any fees, commissions, or any other payment related to unsolicited resumes or CVs except as required in a written contract between Red Hat and the recruitment agency or party requesting payment of a fee.

Red Hat supports individuals with disabilities and provides reasonable accommodations to job applicants. If you need assistance completing our online job application, email [email protected]. General inquiries, such as those regarding the status of a job application, will not receive a reply.