Director, Tech Lead - AI Platforms

Job Classification:

Technology - Engineering & Cloud

Are you interested in building capabilities that enable the organization with innovation, speed, agility, scalability and efficiency? The Global Technology team takes great pride in our culture where digital transformation is built into our DNA! When you join our organization at Prudential, you’ll unlock an exciting and impactful career – all while growing your skills and advancing your profession at one of the world’s leading financial services institutions.

Your Team

As a Director, Tech Lead on the AI Platform team, you will drive the technical strategy, architectural design, and delivery of the integration and platform capabilities powering the enterprise AI Platform. You will build the services and frameworks that enable agent-to-agent communication, AI gateways, model and MCP proxying, tool integration, and secure connectivity to internal and external AI systems.

This is a critical engineering leadership role that blends hands-on coding, architecture, platform reliability, and mentorship. You will work closely with the VP, Product Owner – AI Platform, other AI Tech Leads, engineers, architects, and business partners to deliver scalable, secure, and innovative AI platform capabilities across the enterprise.

This role is based in our office in Newark, NJ. Our organization follows a hybrid work structure where employees can work remotely and from the office, as needed, based on demands of specific tasks or personal work preferences. This position is hybrid and requires your on-site presence on a reoccurring weekly basis at least 3 days per week.

Here is What You Can Expect on a Typical Day

• Define and guide the overall technical architecture and design for the AI Platform and its integration capabilities
• Translate platform strategy into practical, incremental engineering plans and technical roadmaps
• Apply an MVP-focused mindset that balances innovation, reliability, scalability, and long-term sustainability
• Establish and promote engineering patterns, architectural standards, and best practices for AI platform systems
• Lead the design and evolution of core platform services and frameworks that support agentic and AI platform solutions
• Develop reusable platform components, APIs, and tooling that enable consistent and efficient agentic development
• Collaborate with engineering, data, security, and infrastructure partners to ensure solutions are secure, scalable, compliant, and enterprise-aligned
• Design platform capabilities that are adaptable and extensible to support the evolving AI ecosystem
• Ensure platform services follow strong operational, reliability, resiliency, and observability practices
• Apply proven engineering approaches for performance optimization, fault tolerance, and secure design
• Actively participate in the design, development, and implementation of key AI platform capabilities
• Conduct architecture reviews, design reviews, and code reviews to ensure high technical quality
• Mentor engineers and tech leads on system design, API design, testing strategies, and modern development practices
• Remove technical blockers, solve complex engineering challenges, and drive continuous improvement
• Champion strong coding practices, CI/CD, automated testing, and quality engineering standards
• Collaborate closely with product, architecture, and platform leaders to align roadmap priorities with technical feasibility and risk

The Skills & Expertise You Bring

• Bachelor’s degree in Computer Science, Engineering, or equivalent experience
• Extensive software engineering experience, including 3–5 years in a technical leadership role (Tech Lead, Architect, or Director)
• Deep expertise in API design, distributed systems, integration patterns, and microservices architectures
• Hands-on experience with AI integrations, LLMs, model routing, tool execution frameworks, or agentic architectures (strong plus)
• Strong grasp of resiliency patterns, observability, cloud infrastructure, and secure design principles
• Demonstrated ability to code in at least two modern languages (TypeScript/Node.js, Python, Go, or Java)
• Experience leading teams in Agile environments with CI/CD, TDD, and automation-first practices
• Excellent problem-solving and communication skills, with the ability to explain complex technical concepts to diverse audiences

Preferred Qualifications

• Experience with Kubernetes, service mesh technologies, serverless architectures, and Infrastructure as Code tools such as Terraform and Helm
• Familiarity with vector stores, event streaming platforms, and real-time communication frameworks
• Knowledge of Responsible AI, model governance, guardrails, or audits in regulated environments
• Financial services or insurance industry experience is a plus, not required

#LI-LR1 #LI-Hybrid

What we offer you:Prudential is required by state specific laws to include the salary range for this role when hiring a resident in applicable locations. The salary range for this role is from $171,500.00 to $257,300.00. Specific pricing for the role may vary within the above range based on many factors including geographic location, candidate experience, and skills.

• Market competitive base salaries, with a yearly bonus potential at every level. 

• Medical, dental, vision, life insurance, disability insurance, Paid Time Off (PTO), and leave of absences, such as parental and military leave. 

• 401(k) plan with company match (up to 4%). 

• Company-funded pension plan. 

• Wellness Programs including up to $1,600 a year for reimbursement of items purchased to support personal wellbeing needs. 

• Work/Life Resources to help support topics such as parenting, housing, senior care, finances, pets, legal matters, education, emotional and mental health, and career development.  

• Education Benefit to help finance traditional college enrollment toward obtaining an approved degree and many accredited certificate programs.  

• Employee Stock Purchase Plan: Shares can be purchased at 85% of the lower of two prices (Beginning or End of the purchase period), after one year of service. 

Eligibility to participate in a discretionary annual incentive program is subject to the rules governing the program, whereby an award, if any, depends on various factors including, without limitation, individual and organizational performance. To find out more about our Total Rewards package, visit Work Life Balance | Prudential Careers. Some of the above benefits may not apply to part-time employees scheduled to work less than 20 hours per week.