Senior AI Engineer (AI Automation)

BUILD A SAFER WORLD.

TRM Labs provides AI-powered intelligence solutions that help public and private sector agencies investigate and disrupt crime. TRM's platforms enable investigators to trace illicit activity, build cases, and construct operating pictures of threat networks. Leading agencies and businesses worldwide rely on TRM to make the world safer and more secure.

As a Senior AI Engineer, you will be the embedded AI automation engineer for Product, building the agents, automations, and apps that help product managers, product marketers, and designers move faster. You work directly with them, and with engineering, across the product lifecycle from early discovery through launch and adoption. You sit inside the teams, not behind a ticket queue.

The impact you will have

• Move repetitive, manual work into agents and automations so Product, Product Marketing, and Design spend their time on judgment and customer work, not busywork.
• Give teams direct access to customer insight and the data behind it through the tools you build, so they make better-informed decisions.
• Ship agentic solutions teams actually adopt, so the same headcount operates at a scale it otherwise could not.
• Build reusable, maintained components so each new build is faster than the last and no one rebuilds what already exists.
• Turn a rough idea into a working prototype in hours and ship same-day production fixes to shared agents, driving faster speed to market across Product and Marketing.

What we’re looking for

• Strong software engineering in Python or TypeScript. You ship production code, not just workflows wired together.
• Very high AI fluency. You build with AI every day and build agentic solutions on current frontier models, including MCP, retrieval, evals, and observability. Show us something you built.
• Experience taking requirements from non-engineers and finding the need behind the ask.
• Judgment about where AI adds value and where it does not.
• Experience building solutions that non-technical teams adopted and kept using.
• Daily use of AI-assisted coding tools such as Claude Code or Cursor.
• Senior scope: you own problems end to end, need little direction, and are comfortable with ambiguity.

About the Team

• AI Automation Engineering is the engineering home for internal tooling and agents, embedded with Product, Product Marketing, and Design.
• You stay connected to engineering for standards, code review, and shared infrastructure, so what you build holds up in production and compounds across teams.
• The work is high-ownership and ambiguous by design. You set your own priorities and own problems end to end.
• Globally distributed, fully remote, and async-first.

Team Operating Rhythms

• Roughly a 6 hour overlap with 8:00am to 5:00pm PST.
• Embedded side by side with the teams you serve, with a connection back to the AI Automation team and engineering.
• Async-first communication through Slack and written documentation. Distributed, not distant.
• No travel, no onsite, and no on-call.

Required online and collaboration hours

• Schedule: Roughly a 6 hour overlap with 8:00am to 5:00pm CT.

Learn about TRM Speed in this position

• A rough idea becomes a working prototype in hours, so the team reacts to something real instead of a description.
• You ship an improvement to a shared agent or app to production the same day a user reports a problem.
• Within the first 90 days, a team relies on something you built as part of their weekly work.

APPLICATION INSTRUCTIONS

If you’re interested in joining TRM, we encourage you to apply directly. Every application is reviewed by our Talent team.

Before applying, review the job description carefully and highlight the experience and impact that best demonstrate the required qualifications. Please also provide thoughtful and accurate answers to the application questions, as these will be used to evaluate your skills and qualifications for the role.

If you send your resume directly to someone at TRM, we can’t guarantee it will reach the appropriate hiring team. Applying directly is the best way to ensure your application will be considered.

INTERVIEWING WITH TRM

Our process is designed to understand how you think, solve problems, and deliver impact, while allowing you to evaluate TRM. Most interview processes include a case study, an AI skills assessment, and a Leadership Principles interview.

• Recruiter Intro: Qualifications, motivations, and alignment with the role.
• Hiring Manager: Deep dive into your relevant experience, skills, and impact.
• First Round: 1–2 interviews focused on the skills most critical to the role.
• Final Round: Hands-on case study. This is usually a panel-style session where we go deeper into your craft, problem-solving, and alignment with TRM.
• References: Former colleagues who can provide insight into your work and impact.
• Offer: Congrats! Your recruiter will present the offer and compensation details.
• Welcome to TRM: We're excited to build a safer world with you!

Your recruiter will share your specific interview plan and preparation guidance along the way.

AI FLUENCY AT TRM

AI fluency is a baseline expectation at TRM.

We believe AI meaningfully changes how top performers operate. We expect every team member to use AI to accelerate and reimagine their craft, not just automate surface tasks.

At TRM, AI fluency means you are among the top 10 percent of operators in your function in how you apply AI to:

• Accelerate repeatable workflows
• Structure and solve problems
• Improve output quality
• Increase speed and leverage

You will be evaluated on applied AI fluency during the interview process.

LIFE AT TRM

We are building a safer world. That promise shows up in how we work every day.

TRM moves FAST. We are a high-velocity, high-ownership team that expects clarity, follow-through, and impact. People who thrive here are energized by hard problems, experimentation, and continuous feedback. If something takes months elsewhere, it will ship here in days.

Our work sits at the intersection of AI, national security, and fighting crime. The problems are complex, the stakes are real, and the environment evolves quickly. The pace and intensity of the work reflect the importance of the mission. As a result, the way we operate requires a high level of ownership, adaptability, collaboration, and creative problem-solving.

At TRM, you should expect

• Priorities and targets to change quickly
• Operating with a high degree of ambiguity
• A high level of personal ownership and accountability
• Close collaboration across teams and functions
• Frequent, high-touch communication
• Creative problem-solving and out-of-the-box thinking
• A pace that rewards urgency, adaptability, and outcomes

This environment is energizing for people who enjoy building, solving hard problems, and making progress in situations that are not always fully defined. It also requires thriving in ambiguity, adjusting course as new information emerges, and maintaining focus and positivity in a fast-moving and intense environment.

We also recognize that this style of operating is not for everyone. If you are primarily optimizing for predictability or a consistently balanced workload, we encourage you to use the interview process to pressure-test whether this environment is truly the right fit. We want teammates who thrive here, not just survive here.

If you are excited by meaningful problems, motivated by ambitious goals, and energized by working alongside mission-driven colleagues, there is a good chance you will find TRM to be an exceptional place to grow and contribute.

LEADERSHIP PRINCIPLES

We hire and grow against three leadership principles. They’re the standards for how we operate, treat each other, and make decisions.

• Impact-Oriented Trailblazer: We put customers first and move with speed, focus, and adaptability. We treat every plan like an experiment – test, ship, measure, and iterate quickly.
• Master Craftsperson: We care deeply about our craft. We balance speed with high standards, own outcomes end‑to‑end, and invest in getting better everyday.
• Inspiring Colleague: We add clarity and energy, not noise. We bring humility, candor, and a one‑team mindset — giving and receiving feedback to make the team stronger.

JOIN OUR MISSION

At TRM, we care deeply about our craft. We are looking for individuals who want their work to matter, who experiment with speed and rigor, and who take pride in building a safer world for billions of people. If you’re excited by TRM’s mission but don’t check every box, we encourage you to apply — we hire for slope, judgment, and the will to learn fast.

TRM is a Series C company with $220M in total funding, backed by Goldman Sachs, Bessemer, Y Combinator, Thoma Bravo, and others. Headquartered in San Francisco, TRM operates as a distributed-first company with hubs in Los Angeles, San Francisco, New York, Washington D.C., London, and Singapore.

PRIVACY POLICY AND ADDITIONAL INFORMATION

By submitting your application, you agree to allow TRM Labs to process your personal information in accordance with our Privacy Policy https://www.trmlabs.com/policies/privacy-policy.

We collect the information you provide (such as your resume, work history, and contact details) solely for the purpose of evaluating your candidacy for current and future roles at TRM.

Because our hiring cycles for certain positions may span 24 to 36 months, we retain your personal information for up to 36 months from the date of your application. After that period, your data is deleted unless a different retention period is required or permitted by law.

If you are located in the European Economic Area, the United Kingdom, or another jurisdiction with applicable data protection laws, you have the right to access, correct, or request deletion of your personal data at any time before that period ends. To exercise any of these rights, contact us at privacy@trmlabs.com.

To notify TRM Labs that you believe this job posting is non-compliant, please submit a report through this form https://docs.google.com/forms/d/e/1FAIpQLSc6e8jRCl2cQwgIzXLpIGQXtwvMQh__TcokvO2toAAkT44A6Q/viewform?usp=dialog. No response will be provided to inquiries unrelated to job posting compliance.

The use of AI tools of any kind (including but not limited to notetakers, interview assistants, and real-time coaching tools such as Otter.ai, Fireflies, Fathom, Cluey, or similar) during TRM interviews is not permitted without prior approval from TRM. TRM uses its own internal tools for note-taking to ensure a consistent and confidential experience for all candidates.

We are committed to providing reasonable accommodations to applicants with disabilities, and requests can be made via this form https://docs.google.com/forms/d/e/1FAIpQLSevmAzPxWOYm_7kMHb9lEJlX3tpdBeHvvvNWjsI_6xhUfnXjw/viewform?usp=dialog.

RECRUITMENT AGENCIES

TRM Labs does not accept unsolicited agency resumes. Please do not forward resumes to TRM employees. TRM Labs is not responsible for any fees related to unsolicited resumes and will not pay fees to any third-party agency or company without a signed agreement.