Principal AI Engineer

Mom's Meals
Ankeny, IAFull-time$148,500–$165,000Posted Sep 15, 2026

About the role

The Principal AI Engineer serves as Mom's Meals' lead AI consultant and technical expert, partnering with business leaders to identify opportunities, design innovative AI solutions, and implement technologies that improve business outcomes.

This role works directly with functional leaders across the organization to analyze workflows, identify inefficiencies, and develop AI-powered solutions that drive productivity, automation, operational excellence, and informed decision-making. The Principal AI Engineer combines hands-on AI expertise, strong business acumen, and technical leadership to translate complex business challenges into practical, secure, and scalable solutions.

The ideal candidate brings experience with Agentic AI, Generative AI, intelligent automation, and modern enterprise technologies. They can communicate effectively with both technical teams and business stakeholders while helping drive responsible AI adoption throughout Mom's Meals.

This position can be remote with occasional travel required for business meetings, discovery workshop sessions, and company events as needed.

Remote hires will be required to travel to our headquarters in Ankeny, IA (company paid) on their first day for orientation.

At this time, we are NOT considering applicants that require immigration sponsorship (additional work authorization or permanent work authorization) now or in the future to work in the United States. This includes, but IS NOT LIMITED TO: F1-OPT, F1-CPT, H-1B, TN, L-1, J-1, etc.

Salary range: $148,500-165,000

Benefits

Our employees enjoy a generous package of benefits that we are thrilled to provide, and feel is part of what makes us different as an employer. We value our team members, and this is one way we can show it.

Benefits include:

-PTO, holiday pay and holiday of choice

-401(k) match

-Life insurance

-Short-term disability

-Health, dental and vision insurance

-Maternity/paternity leave

-Health savings account (HSA)

-Flex spending accounts (FSA) – health and dependent

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Position Responsibilities may include, but not limited to

AI Strategy & Business Consulting

Partner with business leaders across Mom's Meals to understand strategic objectives, operational challenges, and process inefficiencies

Conduct workflow assessments and discovery sessions to identify opportunities for AI-driven transformation

Translate business requirements into practical AI, automation, and analytics solutions

Develop business cases, value assessments, and implementation roadmaps for AI initiatives

Serve as a trusted advisor on emerging AI technologies, trends, opportunities, and risks

Recommend appropriate approaches using Agentic AI, Generative AI, Machine Learning, Intelligent Document Processing, Robotic Process Automation (RPA), and other relevant methods

AI Solution Design & Technical Leadership

Design practical AI solutions that address complex business challenges and improve operational outcomes

Evaluate requirements and recommend appropriate AI technologies, tools, and implementation approaches

Lead solution design sessions with business and technical stakeholders

Develop AI-enabled workflows, agents, copilots, and automation solutions that integrate with existing enterprise systems

Apply sound cross-platform design practices so solutions are scalable, secure, maintainable, and aligned with company technology standards

Collaborate with application, infrastructure, integration, security, and data teams to deploy and support AI solutions successfully

AI Solution Development

Design, develop, test, and implement AI-powered applications, intelligent agents, copilots, and automation solutions

Build Agentic AI solutions using Large Language Models (LLMs), orchestration frameworks, and Retrieval-Augmented Generation (RAG) techniques

Develop AI solutions that automate business processes, improve employee productivity, enhance decision-making, and strengthen customer experiences

Establish reusable frameworks, accelerators, and engineering practices that enable future AI initiatives

Monitor, optimize, document, and continuously improve AI solutions to maximize reliability and business value

Automation & Process Optimization

Lead intelligent automation initiatives using RPA and AI-enabled workflow technologies

Analyze end-to-end business processes and identify opportunities to reduce manual effort and increase efficiency

Design automated solutions that integrate structured and unstructured business data

Partner with process owners to improve operational performance, adoption, and scalability

Enterprise Integration & Platform Enablement

Design AI solutions that integrate effectively with existing business platforms, applications, and data sources

Collaborate across technology teams to deliver secure, supportable, and sustainable outcomes

Ensure AI initiatives align with enterprise technology, security, data, and governance standards

Identify and promote reusable integration patterns that accelerate responsible AI adoption

AI Governance & Steering Committee Leadership

Serve as a key member of the Mom's Meals AI Steering Committee and provide technical leadership for enterprise AI decisions

Help shape the organization's AI strategy, governance framework, roadmap, and initiative prioritization process

Partner with executive leadership to evaluate AI opportunities and align investments with business objectives

Help establish standards for responsible AI, security, privacy, compliance, model oversight, and risk management

Evaluate emerging AI technologies, platforms, and vendors for business applicability and value

Promote AI literacy and adoption across the organization through education, coaching, and thought leadership

Required Skills and Experience

Bachelor's degree in Computer Science, Information Systems, Data Science, Engineering, or a related field

7+ years’ experience in software engineering, AI engineering, data engineering, automation, analytics, or a related technology discipline

3+ years’ hands-on experience designing and implementing AI, machine learning, intelligent automation, or advanced analytics solutions

Proven experience partnering directly with business stakeholders to solve complex business challenges through technology

Experience leading discovery workshops, process assessments, and solution design sessions

Demonstrated success delivering technology solutions across multiple business systems and platforms

Strong understanding of enterprise applications, cloud platforms, system integrations, and modern data ecosystems

Artificial Intelligence: Agentic AI frameworks and solution patterns; Large Language Models (LLMs) and Generative AI; Retrieval-Augmented Generation (RAG); Prompt engineering and agent design; AI governance and lifecycle management; Model evaluation, monitoring, and optimization

Intelligent Automation; Robotic Process Automation (RPA); Workflow orchestration technologies; Intelligent Document Processing (IDP); Business process automation and optimization

Solution Delivery & Integration: Enterprise application integrations; API concepts and integration patterns; Cloud-based platforms and services; Secure solution design principles; AI deployment, monitoring, documentation, and support

Data & Analytics: SQL and modern data engineering concepts; Data modeling and integration; Analytics and reporting platforms; AI-ready data platform concepts

Preferred Skills and Experience

Master's degree

Salesforce CRM

MuleSoft

Microsoft Dynamics 365 (D365)

Databricks

Microsoft Azure and Azure AI Services

Azure OpenAI

Microsoft Fabric

Microsoft Power Platform

Microsoft Copilot Studio

Experience within manufacturing, logistics, healthcare, food production, supply chain, or other operationally complex environments

Physical Requirements

Repetitive motions that include the wrists, hands and/or fingers

Sedentary work that primarily involves sitting, remaining in a stationary position for prolonged periods

Visual perception to perform job including peripheral vision, depth perception, and the ability to adjust focus

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Responsibilities

  • Partner with business leaders to understand strategic objectives and operational challenges
  • Conduct workflow assessments to identify opportunities for AI-driven transformation
  • Translate business requirements into practical AI, automation, and analytics solutions
  • Design practical AI solutions that address complex business challenges
  • Lead solution design sessions with business and technical stakeholders
  • Develop AI-enabled workflows and automation solutions
  • Monitor, optimize, document, and continuously improve AI solutions

Qualifications

  • Bachelor's degree in Computer Science, Information Systems, Data Science, Engineering, or a related field
  • 7+ years’ experience in software engineering, AI engineering, data engineering, automation, analytics, or a related technology discipline
  • 3+ years’ hands-on experience designing and implementing AI solutions
  • Proven experience partnering with business stakeholders to solve complex challenges

Benefits

  • PTO, holiday pay and holiday of choice
  • 401(k) match
  • Life insurance
  • Short-term disability
  • Health, dental and vision insurance
  • Maternity/paternity leave
  • Health savings account (HSA)
  • Flex spending accounts (FSA)

Skills mentioned

Generative AILarge Language ModelsRetrieval-Augmented GenerationAI AgentsPrompt EngineeringAutomationRobotic Process AutomationWorkflow AutomationAPI IntegrationMicrosoft Azure

About Mom's Meals

Mom’s Meals is a leading national provider of nutrition solutions and home-delivered meals. Our mission is to help patients and seniors get the nutrition they need to maintain independence while: - Managing chronic health conditions - Living with disabilities or limited mobility - Lacking the desire or energy to prepare and cook healthy meals Healthcare Focus: We partner with health insurance companies, managed care organizations and federal and state supported programs to provide nutrition solutions for their client populations suffering from serious chronic diseases. We are a leading nutrition supplier for Medicaid Waiver and offer programs for Medicare Advantage and Dual Eligible beneficiaries. Our personalized selection of meals aid in the recuperation process post hospitalization, improve patient outcomes and reduce costly readmissions. Specialty health-condition menus support dietary requirements for major chronic diseases impacted by nutrition: Heart Disease, Diabetes, and Renal Disease. Additional menus include Gluten-free and Vegetarian options. Our large selection of meals appeal to a variety of individual tastes and are designed by Registered Dietitians, prepared with fresh ingredients by Chefs in USDA-inspected kitchens and distributed across 48 U.S. states to individuals’ homes or congregate sites. Mom’s Meals is part of PurFoods LLC, a privately held and family owned/operated company based in Iowa.

Food and Beverage Manufacturing501-1,000 employeesAnkeny, Iowa