Staff Applied Machine Learning Scientist- GenAI

Work Location Type: Remote Req Number 330464 About Grainger W.W. Grainger, Inc. is a leading broad line distributor with operations primarily in North America and Japan. At Grainger, We Keep the World Working® by serving more than 4.6 million customers worldwide with maintenance, repair and operating (MRO) products and value-added solutions delivered through innovative technology and deep customer expertise. Known for its commitment to service and purpose-driven culture, the Company reported 2025 revenue of $17.9 billion. For more information, visit www.grainger.com. Compensation The anticipated base pay compensation range for this position is $148,900.00 – $248,200.00. This role is eligible for an incentive target of up to 15 based on the achievement of individual and company performance objectives in accordance with the current terms of the incentive program which are subject to change. Sponsorship This position is not eligible for any form of sponsorship now or in the future. Individuals requiring sponsorship (e.g. OPT or H1B visa status) should not apply. Only individuals authorized to work in the United States now and for the foreseeable future will be considered for this position. Rewards and Benefits With benefits starting on day one, our programs provide choice and flexibility to meet team members' individual needs, including: Medical, dental, vision, and life insurance plans with coverage starting on day one of employment and 6 free sessions each year with a licensed therapist to support your emotional wellbeing. 18 paid time off (PTO) days annually for full-time employees (accrual prorated based on employment start date) and 6 company holidays per year. 6% company contribution to a 401(k) Retirement Savings Plan each pay period, no employee contribution required. Employee discounts, tuition reimbursement, student loan refinancing and free access to financial counseling, education, and tools. Maternity support programs, nursing benefits, and up to 14 weeks paid leave for birth parents and up to 4 weeks paid leave for non-birth parents. For additional information and details regarding Grainger’s benefits, please click on the link below: https://experience100.ehr.com/grainger/Home/Tools-Resources/Key-Resources/New-Hire Grainger Benefits The pay range provided above is not a guarantee of compensation. The range reflects the potential base pay for this role at the time of this posting based on the job grade for this position. Individual base pay compensation will depend, in part, on factors such as geographic work location and relevant experience and skills. The anticipated compensation range described above is subject to change and the compensation ultimately paid may be higher or lower than the range described above. Grainger reserves the right to amend, modify, or terminate its compensation and benefit programs in its sole discretion at any time, consistent with applicable law. Position Details Grainger’s Sales Machine Learning team is seeking a Staff Applied Machine Learning Scientist to serve as a technical leader for Generative AI and agentic AI applications across the Sales domain. In this role, you will help design and build Grainger’s Sales AI platform, enabling 3,000+ sellers to work more productively, serve customers more effectively, and drive measurable business growth. You will lead the development of scalable AI systems that combine LLMs, machine learning models, retrieval, tools, APIs, workflow orchestration, evaluation, and monitoring. The work focuses on building production-ready virtual assistants and deep agents across mobile and web experiences. You will set the technical direction, establish patterns for reliable and governed AI systems, mentor engineers, and partner with product, engineering, design, and business stakeholders to turn high-value Sales opportunities into production-ready AI capabilities. The work location is Chicago, IL on a hybrid basis (8 days per month). We will consider highly qualified candidates who are remote, provided they can come onsite during orientation and travel for team meetings, estimated at once per quarter. You Will Design, develop, and maintain both traditional and cutting-edge machine learning models that solve real-world business problems—ensuring scalability, efficiency, and measurable impact Develop applied GenAI capabilities across web and mobile experiences, including seller-facing digital assistants, conversational Q&A, task automation, summarization, workflow guidance, recommendations, and next-best-action intelligence. Design AI systems with appropriate controls for reliability, privacy, security, governance, observability, and human oversight. Collaborate cross-functionally with ML scientists, data/platform/software engineers, UX designers, and product managers to seamlessly integrate models into production systems Establish and champion best practices for model development, deployment, and lifecycle management. Clearly articulate technical concepts and create visual representations to communicate your work and its impact Mentor and empower engineers and scientists, fostering a culture of continuous learning and shared growth. Share knowledge through internal documentation, presentations, and external community engagement Translate customer and product requirements into ML strategies that deliver tangible, data-driven outcomes Contribute to robust, maintainable codebases and scalable ML infrastructure that supports long-term innovation Stay at the forefront of research and technology, continuously evaluating and applying emerging methods that add value to the organization You Have Master's degree in computer science, data science, statistics, mathematics, or a closely related field 5+ years of experience designing and building scalable AI/ML applications and systems in cloud environments. Experience developing virtual assistants, digital assistants, conversational AI applications, agentic workflows, recommendation systems, or AI-powered decision-support tools. Production-grade implementation experience using PyTorch, HuggingFace, MLFlow Experience using frameworks to build LLM-based applications or agentic workflows, such as LangGraph, LangSmith, LangChain, LlamaIndex, or similar. Experience designing AI evaluation systems, including offline evaluation, online monitoring, hallucination and quality checks, latency measurement, user feedback loops, and business impact tracking. Experience with the end-to-end software development lifecycle, including CI/CD pipelines, Kubernetes-based deployments, testing, monitoring, alerting, backend systems, APIs, and production support. Strong Python fundamentals, with experience using modern ML, data, and LLM application development libraries. Ability to provide technical leadership, influence architecture, mentor team members, and communicate complex AI/ML concepts to technical and non-technical audiences. Preferred PhD computer science, data science, statistics, mathematics, or a closely related field Experience with deep agent or multi-agent architectures, including planning, reasoning, tool use, tool dispatch, error recovery, session state, memory, sub-agent coordination, and feedback loops. Experience designing AI agent skill systems, including reusable capability packages, skill registries, versioning, security vetting, governance controls, and lifecycle management. Experience building digital assistant experiences for web, mobile, CRM, seller productivity, customer support, or enterprise workflow applications. Production model serving experience with vLLM, Triton Inference Server, TensorRT, Ray Serve, TorchServe, or similar low-latency serving infrastructure. We are committed to equal employment opportunity regardless of race, color, ancestry, religion, sex (including pregnancy), national origin, sexual orientation, age, citizenship, marital status, disability, gender identity or expression, protected veteran status or any other protected characteristic under federal, state, or local law. We are proud to be an equal opportunity workplace. We are committed to fostering an inclusive, accessible work environment that includes both providing reasonable accommodations to individuals with disabilities during the application and hiring process as well as throughout the course of one’s employment, should you need a reasonable accommodation during the application and selection process, including, but not limited to use of our website, any part of the application, interview or hiring process, please advise us so that we can provide appropriate assistance.