Lead AI Consultant

Lead AI Consultant Strategic & hands-on consulting role with ability to design and deliver production-ready AI systems. Title : Lead AI Consultant Location : This is a hybrid role based in either Sydney or Melbourne. You must have current working rights in Australia. Role Snippet : This is a client facing consulting role where you will be both strategic and hands-on. We’re open to candidates from software engineering, machine learning, or data science backgrounds - what matters most is your ability to design and deliver production-ready AI systems. You understand that effective AI solutions go beyond prompting, and have experience building the surrounding systems- retrieval, orchestration, evaluation, and integration. About DiUS DiUS is Australia’s premier B2B technology consulting partner, trusted to tackle our clients' most complex engineering and digital/AI transformation challenges. Our expertise is recognised in the market: we were the First Partner in APJ to attain the AWS Applied AI Competency and the First in ANZ to attain the AWS Machine Learning Competency. We specialise in moving clients from AI concepts to scalable, production-ready Generative AI and Agentic systems. This depth of capability, backed by a GenAI Strategic Collaboration Agreement with AWS, is why we are the go-to company for high-impact projects. Our reputation is built on long-standing trust: 95% of our business comes from repeat and referrals, and we maintain a 95% client NPS. We help organisations of all sizes solve hard engineering problems, modernise applications, and deliver new products to market with confidence. About The Role Each client brings different challenges, tech stacks, and levels of AI maturity. In this role, you’ll work across a variety of projects, ranging from embedding AI into existing platforms to designing and delivering end-to-end AI-powered products and experiences. This is a hands-on role where you will lead the design and delivery of custom AI solutions while remaining close to the technology. You’ll architect and build systems using modern languages, frameworks, and cloud platforms, applying approaches such as LLMs, RAG, and agent-based workflows where appropriate. As a lead consultant, you will work directly with clients to understand their business problems, ask the right questions, and translate ambiguous requirements into well-defined, scalable solutions. You’ll shape solution approaches, define and prioritise backlogs, and guide delivery from concept through to production. You’ll play a key role in building strong client relationships, collaborating across multidisciplinary teams, and ensuring that solutions are not only technically sound, but aligned to broader business outcomes. You will also play a significant role in supporting DiUS’ long-term growth and influence, helping shape and grow our internal AI skills and capability, mentoring others and championing AI culture and performance. About You You come from a strong technical background in either software engineering, machine learning, or data science, with experience building and delivering production-grade systems. You’ve worked across different languages, frameworks, and environments, and are comfortable operating across the stack - from application logic through to cloud infrastructure. You have hands-on experience building AI-powered applications, not just experimenting with them. This may come from a software engineering pathway or a more traditional ML/data science background, but in either case, you’ve applied LLMs in real-world scenarios - designing prompts, building RAG pipelines, and/or implementing agent-based workflows - and understand the trade-offs involved in bringing these systems into production. You bring a strong understanding of cloud platforms (AWS, GCP, or Azure) and are comfortable deploying, integrating, and operating AI systems in production environments, with an appreciation for scalability, reliability, cost, and performance. You’re comfortable operating in ambiguity. You can take a loosely defined problem, ask the right questions, and shape a practical, scalable solution. You balance pragmatism with creativity, and know when to simplify rather than over-engineer. You’re a strong communicator who can engage with both technical and non-technical stakeholders. Whether your experience comes from consulting or working across multiple projects, you’re able to build trust, navigate complexity, and move work forward. You take ownership of outcomes, not just output. You care about delivering solutions that are robust, usable, and aligned to real business needs. Tech Skills Experience building production AI systems Full Stack software engineering foundations with the ability to build real systems strong proficiency in multiple modern languages (e.g. Python, Typescript / Javascript) experience building APIs / services and back end systems understanding of clean code, modular design, version control and testing Applied LLM experience, building something used by real users or stakeholders hands-on experience with LLM APIs (e.g. OpenAI, Anthropic) prompt design and iteration context handling (tokens, limits, structuring input/output) RAG experience designing RAG pipelines (document ingestion, chunking strategies, embeddings) vector databases retrieval concepts Experienced with AI system design (end to end thinking) designing systems that combine LLM, data sources, APIs/services understanding when to use LLMs vs traditional approaches understands system boundaries and architectures Cloud & deployment experience - you must be able to run things in production experience with at least one cloud platform (AWS, GCP, Azure) exposure to deploying services & managing environments awareness of scaling, reliability & cost Agent & workflow experience Designing multi-step workflows Tool usage (APIs, functions) Understanding when agents are appropriate Consulting Skills Leading projects and teams end to end Supporting pre-sales efforts - joining client meetings to understand requirements, working alongside internal stakeholders to identify solutions and participate in proposal and client estimations Able to problem solve and design purposeful solutions, factoring in the integration of a wider solution/system Collaborate with clients and teams to shape project milestones and lead implementation and delivery outcomes Able to navigate a range of client environments and adapt to different paces, from the complexity of a large enterprise to influencing in a fast-paced start-up Excellent communication skills - this is a role where you are talking to clients, leading conversations and providing guidance & expertise Can navigate through ambiguity and find a way forward Collaborate across teams and at all levels of an organisation Able to efficiently manage and coordinate / prioritise tasks and workload Curious with a growth mindset, always seeking to learn and investing in own development Passionate about spreading change through thought leadership, mentoring, meetups, writing blogs or staying active on GitHub. A change champion who can influence and drive transformation Want to know more about this role, or think you've got what it takes? Apply now! **** Note to Recruitment Agencies: we got this - no need to reach out! Department Engineering Locations Sydney Remote status Hybrid Employment type Full-time