Director of AI Engineering

Talkiatry is seeking a Director of AI to drive AI innovations that make high quality mental healthcare more accessible. In this role, you’ll be the founding member of our AI technical team, defining and executing its roadmap, and lead cross-functional efforts spanning engineering, clinical, compliance, and product teams. 
About Talkiatry: Talkiatry transforms psychiatry with accessible, human, and responsible care. We’re a national mental health practice co-founded by a patient and a triple-board-certified psychiatrist to solve the problems both groups face in accessing and providing the highest quality treatment.      60% of adults in the U.S. with a diagnosable mental illness go untreated every year because care is inaccessible, while 45% of clinicians are out of network with insurers because reimbursement rates are low, and paperwork is unduly burdensome.  With innovative technology and a human-centered philosophy, we provide patients with the care they need—and allow psychiatrists to focus on why they got into medicine. 

You will:

• Define and lead the AI roadmap across experimentation, model evaluation, deployment, and iteration. 
• Architect systems to support safe and scalable LLM interactions—including prompt chaining, memory retention, and RAG pipelines. 
• Develop strategies for model selection (e.g., Azure OpenAI, AWS Bedrock, open-source) and cost-effective inference at scale. 
• Design and implement experiments to evaluate the efficacy, safety, and impact of AI innovations. 
• Build and scale a high-performing AI team across machine learning, data science, MLOps, and backend infrastructure.. 
• Serve as the AI technical authority in conversations with external vendors, cloud partners, compliance officers, and executive stakeholders. 
• Partner with legal and clinical teams to ensure HIPAA compliance, BAA alignment, and safe handling of sensitive patient data. 

You have - Technical Skills:

• Expert in large language models (OpenAI, Anthropic, Mistral, etc.), including fine-tuning, prompt engineering, embeddings, and context window optimization. 
• Hands-on experience with RAG frameworks, vector databases (Pinecone, FAISS, Redis), and memory architectures. 
• Strong programming background in Python and ML stack (PyTorch, HuggingFace Transformers, LangChain, Weights & Biases). 
• Proficiency with cloud platforms (AWS, Azure), containerization (Docker, Kubernetes), and orchestration tools (Airflow, FastAPI, etc.). 
• Deep familiarity with model evaluation frameworks—automated and 
• human-in-the-loop—for conversation safety, empathy, and hallucination detection. 

You have:

• 7+ years of experience in AI/ML roles, with at least 3 years leading cross-functional teams including engineering, product, and research. 
• A successful track record of shipping production-grade AI systems—ideally in healthcare, mental health, or another mission-critical domain. 
• Deep technical fluency in LLMs, retrieval systems, and safe interaction design—with an ability to lead architectural decisions and implementation. 
• Experience building or managing AI teams from 0→1, with a strong recruiting eye and mentorship skills. 
• Familiarity with ethical AI, including red-teaming, bias mitigation, explainability, and escalation protocols for risky outputs. 
• Strong understanding of healthcare compliance (e.g., HIPAA, PHI), including how to architect systems with auditability and patient safety in mind. 
• A pragmatic approach to experimentation and iteration—balancing cutting-edge AI with operational feasibility and clinical guardrails. 
• Exceptional communication skills—you can convey technical decisions to both engineers and executives, and lead strategic conversations with confidence. 

Why Talkiatry:

• Top-notch team: Join a diverse, motivated group committed to reshaping mental health care. 
• Collaborative environment: Work in a supportive setting where innovation is encouraged. 
• Flexible hybrid location: While this is a field-based role, you’ll also have the flexibility to work from home and visit our Manhattan office (NoMad) as needed. 
• Excellent benefits: Talkiatry offers comprehensive medical, dental, and vision plans effective from day one, 401K with match, generous PTO, paid holidays, paid parental leave, and more. 
• Growth potential: As Talkiatry expands, you’ll have opportunities to enhance your skills and advance your career. 
• Meaningful impact: Help remove barriers to mental health care in underserved communities and make a tangible difference in the lives of patients and providers. 

Talkiatry participates in E-Verify and will provide the federal government with your Form I-9 information to confirm that you are authorized to work in the U.S. only after a job offer is accepted and Form I-9 is completed. For more information on E-Verify, please visit the following: EVerify Participation & IER Right to Work.    At Talkiatry, we are an equal opportunity employer committed to a diverse, inclusive, and equitable workplace and candidate experience. We strive to create an environment where everyone has a sense of belonging and purpose, and where we learn from the unique experiences of those around us.   We encourage all qualified candidates to apply regardless of race, color, ancestry, religion, national origin, sexual orientation, age, citizenship, marital or family status, disability, gender, gender identity or expression, pregnancy or caregiver status, veteran status, or any other legally protected status.