AI Engineering Director

Job description

Riverflex is building a frontier AI engineering practice — the kind our clients wish existed as they navigate complex intelligent transformation programmes. In this role, you lead it: developing the architecture, the team, the products and accelerators, and the trajectory of AI engineering at Riverflex. This is not a management-only role: you architect and code alongside your team, ship systems to production for blue-chip clients, and develop the reusable accelerators that make delivery best-in-class.

This role reports directly to the founders and carries a clear path to Director — Riverflex's most senior level — with a profit-share compensation model that rewards practice ownership. You co-create new service offerings as the AI market evolves, sit in the room with C-level clients, and partner with the founding team on commercial growth. The path is yours to build.

About Riverflex

Riverflex is building an integrated service across strategy and transformation consulting, talent services, and business-accelerating products. The company works with leaders driving transformative change, and this role sits at the centre of its AI engineering growth.

Responsibilities

Technical Leadership and Delivery

• Architect and ship AI systems for complex client engagements — meaningful production work, not pilots that die in PowerPoint
• Own system design decisions across LLM-based applications, agentic architectures, RAG pipelines, evaluation frameworks, and model routing
• Serve as senior technical lead on client engagements
• Drive technical quality, code review, and engineering standards across the AI practice

Offering Development and Products and Accelerators

• Design and ship at least one core reusable Riverflex AI accelerator (e.g. agentic harness, eval framework, RAG pipeline template) within the first year
• Co-develop new client service offerings in partnership with the strategy team as the AI landscape evolves
• Allocate time to R&D, internal IP, and new offering development

Team Build and Scaling

• Scale the AI engineering team within 12 months — hire, calibrate, and retain
• Set the bar for engineering talent: own hiring loops, technical assessments, and onboarding
• Develop engineers through coaching, pairing, and structured growth paths

Commercial and Client Engagement

• Partner with founders in C-level client conversations — co-piloting in year one, with growing autonomy by month 12
• Scope complex AI engagements, translating client problems into deliverable technical architectures
• Contribute to practice growth through commercial credibility and client trust

Job Requirements

• 10+ years of engineering experience, with meaningful time leading technical teams (4–5+ years in technical leadership)
• Deep capability in modern AI systems: LLMs, agentic architectures, RAG, evaluation, model routing
• Proven ability to architect and ship production systems — not just prototype or advise
• Hands-on with hiring, calibration, and developing engineers
• Comfortable with ambiguity, allergic to bureaucracy
• English fluent

The following are a plus:

• Production GenAI track record (we are equally open to candidates who will build this track record at Riverflex)
• Ex-startup CTO (Series A–C, AI-first product company), senior staff/principal engineer at a scale-up (e.g. Booking, Adyen, Picnic, Mollie), or frontier-lab IC (e.g. Anthropic, OpenAI, DeepMind, Mistral, Cohere) ready to commercialise
• Dutch language skills
• Experience with consulting delivery or client-facing technical advisory

What We Offer

• Clear progression with profit-share upside tied to practice performance
• A competitive compensation package.
• 25 days off per year, plus closure for the week between Christmas and New Year
• Flexible work from abroad options, for up to 6 weeks per year
• Pension scheme to help you plan for your future
• Personal Learning and Development budget, including full access to all Udemy courses
• Classpass membership, so you can nurture your mind and body regularly
• Access to the latest tech and tools, including laptop, home office budget, and professional software like ChatGPT Pro, Sembly, SlideHub, Notion, and Riverflex’s own in-house software
• Equity share scheme, giving long-term team members ownership of Riverflex

Why This Role

You anchor AI engineering at Riverflex for the next 3–5 years. The mandate is real: scale a team, ship production AI for blue-chip clients, and build the IP that defines how Riverflex delivers. The founders are in the room with you, the clients are serious, and the autonomy is yours from day one. If you've hit a ceiling on ownership elsewhere, this is the role where you build the practice you've been waiting for.