Applied AI Engineer (Contract)

remote
Remote, Remote, Canada .
contract . October 27, 2026

Description

Applied AI Engineer (Contract)

About the role

Upstream Works Software is hiring a contract Applied AI Engineer to contribute to the setup of our agentic AI evaluation and demo environment on Amazon Bedrock AgentCore.

Upstream Works is a Canadian software company with 25 years of experience in enterprise contact centre software, trusted by Cisco, Amazon Web Services and global partners.

Our platform brings AI into the contact centre, and this engagement will help us prove agent quality before it reaches customers.

You will own the hands on build: setting up AgentCore, creating a golden dataset and evaluation process, and delivering an end to end demo shaped around a real business use case. You will work closely with our Product Lead, who will define the business requirements the demo needs to meet.

Key responsibilities

The work runs in three phases, each with a clear deliverable.

Setup AWS AgentCore

Lead the setup of Amazon Bedrock AgentCore in our AWS environment, including Runtime, Observability and Evaluations.
Configure secure access, permissions and logging following AWS best practices.
Document the setup so our team can maintain and extend it.

Build the golden dataset and evaluation process

Work with our Product Lead and subject matter experts to define realistic scenarios, expected responses and the steps the agent should take.
Build and version a golden dataset that reflects real contact centre interactions, using anonymized or synthetic data.
Design the evaluation approach, including success criteria, built in and custom evaluators, and a repeatable process for regression testing as the agent changes.
Report on agent quality in a way business stakeholders can understand.

Build an end to end demo in AgentCore

Build a working agent and connect it to the tools and data the use case needs.
Shape the demo around the business requirements defined with our Product Lead, and iterate based on feedback.
Prepare and present the demo to internal stakeholders.

Throughout the engagement, you will share regular progress updates, flag risks early, and leave behind clear documentation and reusable components.

Required Qualifications

3 or more years of hands on software or AI engineering experience, including building at least one LLM based application or agent that reached production or real users
Hands on experience with Amazon Bedrock and Amazon Bedrock AgentCore
Strong Python skills, including APIs, SDKs and data handling
Experience building AI agents with tool or function calling, retrieval, and at least one agent framework (for example, Strands, LangGraph, CrewAI or similar)
Experience designing evaluations for non deterministic AI systems, such as golden datasets, success criteria, LLM as a judge, and regression testing
Working knowledge of core AWS services, including IAM, CloudWatch, Lambda and S3
Ability to turn business requirements into a working technical solution with limited direction
Excellent written and verbal English, and the ability to explain technical results to non-technical stakeholders
Availability for regular meetings during Eastern Time business hours

Would Be An Asset

Experience with conversational AI or voice agents (for example, Amazon Connect, Cisco or Genesys)
AWS certifications, such as AWS Certified AI Practitioner, Machine Learning Engineer Associate or Solutions Architect Associate
Experience with Model Context Protocol (MCP) or AgentCore Gateway
Experience setting up evaluation in CI/CD pipelines
Experience handling sensitive customer data, including anonymization and privacy requirements

Know someone who would be a perfect fit? Let them know!