Position Title: AI/ML Engineer (Junior)

Duration: Direct Hire

Location: Leawood, KS

Schedule: weekly hybrid

*Must have active Top Secret Clearance*

*Must be US Citizen and pass Federal Background Check and Drug Screen*

Start Date: September

Qualifications:

· B.S. degree in Computer Science, Engineering, or related field.

· 1–3 years of experience in software engineering or applied ML (including internships or academic projects).

· Strong Python programming skills.

· Familiarity with one or more ML/NLP libraries (e.g., scikit-learn, spaCy, Transformers from Hugging Face).

· Basic understanding of data preprocessing, model training, and evaluation workflows.

· Exposure to cloud platforms (AWS, Azure, or GCP) or interest in learning them.

· Strong communication and collaboration skills; eagerness to learn from peers and mentors.

· Industry experience, preferably within the defense industry and/or intelligence community or related sectors, a plus.

· Awareness of ethical considerations and responsible AI practices.

· Strong problem-solving skills, attention to detail, and ability to thrive in a fast-paced, collaborative environment.

· Hands-on experience with LLMs, embeddings, or vector search (not required, nice to have)

· Awareness of DevOps practices like CI/CD or Docker (not expected to own these at this level)

· Exposure to databases (SQL or NoSQL), data pipelines, or orchestration tools (Airflow, Prefect) (not required, nice to have).

· Familiarity with MLOps concepts or tools such as MLflow, DVC, or FastAPI (not required, nice to have).

Key Responsibilities:

· Implement, train, evaluate, and maintain ML models using frameworks such as Scikit-learn, spaCy, or PyTorch/TensorFlow.

· Collaborate with team members to build retrieval and generation pipelines using large language models and embeddings.

· Contribute to data preparation and feature engineering processes to improve model performance.

· Support development of prototype applications using LLM frameworks (e.g., LangChain, Haystack, or similar).

· Perform experiments and evaluations on NLP/NLU tasks (classification, entity resolution, information retrieval).

· Learn and apply best practices for model deployment and monitoring in production environments.

· Participate in code reviews, documentation, and agile team activities.

Company Details/mission:

You will be at the forefront of building software that scales across platform capabilities.

Your software will be deployed across an array of operational and research & development efforts for mission-critical customer programs and projects.

Each of our customers requires unique technical solutions to enable an asymmetric advantage on the battlefield. Patented software helps remove common obstacles such as manual-intensive data processing, parsing, and analysis, thereby reducing cognitive burden for the warfighter. Our end-to-end data processing, orchestration, and fusion platform supports a wide variety of military use cases, domains, operations, and echelons. Customers enjoy enterprise-grade capabilities that meet specialized needs.

Our client encourages company wide

collaboration to share context, skills, and expertise across a variety of tools, technologies, and development practices. You’ll work autonomously while driving coordinated, collaborative decisions across cross-functional teams comprised of defense and national security experts, veterans, business leaders, and experienced software engineers.

Your code will advance back-end data orchestration and graph-compute capabilities to deliver elegant data and intelligence products. You will have the opportunity to harden and scale existing platform capabilities, tools, and technologies, while also working to innovate and introduce new iterative capabilities and features which benefit our company and customers.

Successful candidates thrive in a fast-paced, entrepreneurial, and mission-driven environment. We hire brilliant patriots. You’ll be encouraged to think creatively, challenge conventional thinking, and identify alternative approaches for delivering value to customers across complex problem sets. Your day-to-day will vary, adapting to the requirements of our customers and the technical needs of respective use cases. One day, you may be supporting the development of a new proof of capability concept for a new customer program; another you may be focused on optimizing system performance to help scale a production deployment; the next you may be working directly with customers to understand their requirements with deep intellectual curiosity.

· Our flat operating model puts every employee at the forefront of our customers’ missions.

· We value customer intimacy, unique perspectives, and dedication to delivering lasting impact and results. You’ll have the opportunity to work on the frontlines of major customer programs and influence lasting success for your teammates.

· You’ll have the opportunity to gain experience across a wide range of projects and tasks, from designing and demonstrating early capabilities and prototypes to deploying large-scale mission systems.

· You’ll contribute directly to continued position as a market leader for data infrastructure AI and compete against multi-billion-dollar incumbents and high-tech AI companies.

Work Location

We are hiring for roles at our headquarters in Leawood, KS and remotely in the Arlington, VA region. Candidates in the Arlington, VA region may work remotely while not on customer site.

· Equity: All employees are eligible to participate in the company equity incentive program within their first 12 months of employment. We are proud that 100% of our employees are equity-owning partners

· Competitive salary and annual performance bonus opportunities.

· Unlimited PTO.

· 11 paid holidays each year.

· Incredible professional development and learning opportunities in a fast-paced high-tech environment and exciting industry.

· Weekly in-office catering in our Leawood HQ.

Benefits

Our client values employee well-being and, in turn, offers exceptional benefits options which greatly exceed regional and national averages for similar companies.

401k Plan

· Offers a 401k plan through John Hancock. While the company does not offer employee matching, we offer 3% profit sharing for all employees who elect to participate in the 401k plan. Profit sharing is calculated based on company performance at the end of each calendar year and distributed to 401k accounts at the start of each calendar year.

Medical

· Three medical options: PPO, HSA, and TRICARE.

· HSA contribution is 250%–350% higher than average employer contributions in Kansas City and Arlington regions.

· Only ~18% of employers offer TRICARE Supplement plans.

Spending Accounts

· Above-market employer funding and flexibility.

· HSA: Triple-tax advantage

· FSA: $50-$3,300 annual contribution, $660 rollover

· Dependent Care FSA: $100-$5,000, pre-tax savings on child/dependent care.

Dental

· High Plan annual maximum is ~2.6x higher than the national average.

· High Renaissance Plan: $5,000 annual max, 50% or up to $1,000.

· Low Renaissance Plan: $1,000 annual max, no ortho.

Vision

· Frame allowance is 25-35% higher than typical employer-sponsored plans.

· Vision through Renaissance with VSP Choice network: $0 exams, lenses covered in full, and $180 frame allowance

Life Insurance

· Employer-paid 1x base salary and additional voluntary options for employees and spouses, compared to most employers who only cover $50k basic life on average.

About Us

ECCO Select is certified as a Women-owned, Minority-owned, Small Business Enterprise. We are a talent acquisition and advisory consulting company, specializing in providing people, process, and technology solutions for our clients’ needs. ECCO Select has experience in assisting our commercial and government clients successfully manage projects and programs that transform their business operations through a variety of IT solutions. We’re the talent behind the technology. To find out more about ECCO visit www.eccoselect.com.

Our Commitment
We would love to have you join our team! ECCO Select is committed to hiring and retaining a diverse workforce. ECCO Select’s policy is to provide equal opportunity to all people without regard to race, color, religion, national origin, ancestry, marital status, veteran status, age, disability, pregnancy, genetic information, citizenship status, sex, sexual orientation, gender identity or any other legally protected category.

Equal Employment Opportunity is The Law

This Organization Participates in E-Verify

Job Type: Full-time

Pay: $115,000.00 - $120,000.00 per year

Benefits:

401(k)
401(k) matching
Dental insurance
Health insurance
Health savings account
Life insurance
Vision insurance

Application Question(s):

Are you familiar with ML/NLP libraries or ML models such as skikit-learn, spaCy, PyTorch/TensorFlow or transformers from Hugging Face?
Do you have strong Python programming skills?
Do you have hands-on experience with LLMs?
Any familiarity with MLOps concepts such as MLflow, DVC, or FastAPI?
Any experience with LangChain, Haystack, or similar LLM framework tools?
Due to the Federal government nature of this work, US Citizenship is required. Do you meet this requirement?
Do you currently hold an active Top Secret Clearance?

Work Location: Hybrid remote in Leawood, KS 66211

Ecco Select

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