Capital One Seeks Senior Lead Machine Learning Engineer to Drive Innovation at Scale
Capital One is actively recruiting a Senior Lead Machine Learning Engineer (MLE) to join an Agile team focused on the productionization of machine learning applications and systems. The role demands a seasoned professional capable of navigating the complexities of machine learning architecture, code development, and ensuring high-performance, highly available applications.
The Expanding Role of Machine Learning Engineering
The modern Machine Learning Engineer role is increasingly interdisciplinary, bridging the gap between operations, modeling, and data engineering. As a result, Capital One’s MLEs are expected to contribute across a broad spectrum of activities. “The MLE role overlaps with many disciplines,” the company stated in a recent release, emphasizing the need for versatile expertise.
Core Responsibilities and Technical Demands
The position centers around designing, building, and delivering machine learning models and components that address real-world business challenges. This requires close collaboration with Product and Data Science teams, and a deep understanding of the entire ML lifecycle. Key responsibilities include:
- Infrastructure Decisions: Leveraging knowledge of ML modeling techniques – including model selection, data considerations, feature engineering, training, hyperparameter tuning, and validation – to inform infrastructure choices.
- Problem Solving & Coding: Developing and validating ML models, writing and testing application code, and automating testing and deployment processes.
- Agile Collaboration: Working within a cross-functional Agile team to enhance big data and ML applications.
- Model Maintenance: Retraining, maintaining, and monitoring models in production environments.
- Cloud Technologies: Utilizing and building cloud-based architectures and platforms to deliver optimized ML models at scale.
- Data Pipelines: Constructing optimized data pipelines to effectively feed ML models.
- DevOps Practices: Implementing continuous integration and continuous deployment (CI/CD) best practices, including test automation and monitoring.
- Responsible AI: Ensuring code quality, model governance, and adherence to best practices in Responsible and Explainable AI.
Proficiency in programming languages such as Python, Scala, or Java is essential.
Qualifications: Experience and Expertise
Candidates must possess a Bachelor’s Degree and at least eight years of experience designing and building data-intensive solutions using distributed computing. A minimum of four years of programming experience with Python, Scala, or Java is also required, alongside three years of experience building, scaling, and optimizing ML systems. Demonstrated leadership experience, with at least two years leading teams developing ML solutions, is a critical component of the role.
Preferred qualifications include a Master’s or Doctoral degree in a related field (computer science, electrical engineering, mathematics, etc.), experience deploying ML solutions on public cloud platforms like AWS, Azure, or Google Cloud Platform, and four or more years of hands-on experience with industry-recognized ML frameworks such as scikit-learn, PyTorch, Dask, Spark, or TensorFlow. Experience with data gathering and preparation for ML models, performant code development, and people management are also highly valued. A track record of contributing to the ML industry through publications, presentations, or open-source projects is a plus.
Compensation and Benefits
Capital One has publicly disclosed salary ranges for the Senior Lead Machine Learning Engineer position, varying by location:
- Boston, MA: $225,400 – $257,200
- McLean, VA: $225,400 – $257,200
- New York, NY: $245,900 – $280,600
- San Francisco, CA: $245,900 – $280,600
- San Jose, CA: $245,900 – $280,600
Salaries for positions in other locations will be adjusted accordingly. The role is also eligible for performance-based incentives, including cash bonuses and long-term incentives. Capital One offers a comprehensive benefits package encompassing health, financial wellness, and other support services. More details can be found on the Capital One Careers website.
Commitment to Diversity and Inclusion
Capital One is an equal opportunity employer and is committed to non-discrimination in compliance with all applicable laws. The company also promotes a drug-free workplace and will consider sponsoring qualified applicants for employment authorization. Applicants requiring accommodations during the application process can contact Capital One Recruiting at 1-800-304-9102 or via email at [email protected].
