Lead Machine Learning Engineer

Company Overview: At Sephora we inspire our customers, empower our teams, and help them become the best versions of themselves. We create an environment where people are valued, and differences are celebrated. Every day, our teams across the world bring to life our purpose: to expand the way the world sees beauty by empowering the Extra Ordinary in each of us. We are united by a common goal – to reimagine the future of beauty. The Opportunity: Technology Our technology team works fast and smart. With San Francisco as our home, we take bringing new tech to market seriously, developing the latest in mobile technologies, scalable architecture, and the coolest in-store client experience. We love what we do and we have fun doing it. The Technology group is comprised of motivated self-starters and true team players that are absolutely integral to the growth of Sephora and our future success. Your role at Sephora... This is an opportunity for a Lead Machine Learning Engineer to come in and drive AI/ML initiatives for the enterprise. Sephora continues to inspire our loyal customers in beauty space, and AI/ML is redefining the way we inspire our customers. Some exciting initiatives in action: Generative AI use cases to help our customers discover products by developing AI agents Adopting reinforcement learning for hyper personalization Building RAG based knowledge bases for AI agents Model Context Protocol (MCP) Enablement to accelerate AI adoption As a Lead Machine Learning Engineer, you will operationalize innovative AI/ML solutions and work alongside other team members like Product Manager, Enterprise Architect, ML Engineers, Data scientists and Business to architect, design, build and productionalize AI/ML models. You will be also responsible for integrating AI/ML solutions into operational products. This hands‑on technical role demands excellent Data Science, ML engineering and ML ops/LLM Ops knowledge and can demonstrate best practices in the industry. Come be a part of a team that is starting this new journey. We are looking for someone who is a technology‑agnostic polymath—committed to a lifelong journey of learning and exploration of new scientific ideas—and will bring thoughtful perspectives, empathy, creativity, and a positive attitude to solve problems at scale. This role is ideal for someone looking to extend their Data Science, machine learning and software engineering skills to lead an AI/ML engineering team and create impact by delivering AI/ML capabilities at scale. Responsibilities: Architect, build, maintain scalable systems using established design patterns, leads security‑first practices, and maintains deep domain expertise while anticipating future technical needs and costs Implement end‑to‑end solutions for batch and real‑time algorithms along with tooling around monitoring, logging, automated testing, performance testing and A/B testing Collaborate with Product, Engineering, Data Scientists, ML Engineers and Business teams on planning new capabilities Establish scalable, efficient, automated processes for data analyses, model development, validation and implementation Write efficient and well‑organized software to ship products in an iterative, continual‑release environment Reviews and prioritizes epics/projects with proper breakdown and dependency management, proactively identifies and communicates blockers or delays, handles uncertainty and high‑pressure situations decisively, and applies economic thinking to optimize value delivery Mentor teammates to adopt best practices in writing and maintaining production machine learning code and growth opportunities, fosters cultures of effective communication, feedback, and knowledge sharing, builds strong cross‑functional relationships, and collaborates on engineering strategy while contributing to product roadmap development. We're excited about you if you have: 5+ years experience developing and deploying machine learning systems into production 8+ years experience in Software Engineering 2-4 years experience working with AI Agentic systems, LLMs, and RAG architecture Experience working with MCP (Model Context Protocol) Experience using open source LLMs and LLMOPs 3-5 years experience working with a variety of relational SQL and NoSQL databases Experience working with: Spark, Kafka, Scala, Python, etc. Experience with deep learning frameworks such as PyTorch, TensorFlow, Keras or similar Experience with object‑oriented/object function scripting languages: Python, Java, C++, Scala, etc. Experience building and operationalizing feature stores Experience working with distributed systems, service‑oriented architectures, and designing APIs Write efficient and well‑organized software to ship products in an iterative, continual‑release environment Excellent communication skills, with the ability to explain complex technical concepts to technical and non‑technical audiences Knowledge of cloud platforms, for example: Experience with Azure, AWS or equivalent cloud platforms Microsoft Azure:Experience designing, deploying, and administering scalable, available, and fault tolerant systems on Microsoft Azure Hands‑on Experience working with Databricks Familiarity in deploying real‑time ML systems on Azure Cloud through frameworks such as ONNX, MLEAP, TF Serving, etc. Knowledge of data pipeline and workflow management tools Expertise in standard software engineering methodology, e.g. unit testing, test automation, continuous integration, code reviews, design documentation Relevant working experience with Kubernetes. The annual base salary range for this position is $186,390.00- $207,100.00. The actual base salary offered depends on a variety of factors, which may include, as applicable, the applicant’s qualifications for the position; years of relevant experience; specific and unique skills; level of education attained; certifications or other professional licenses held; other legitimate, non‑discriminatory business factors specific to the position; and the geographic location in which the applicant lives and/or from which they will perform the job. Individuals employed in this position may also be eligible to earn bonuses. Sephora offers a generous benefits package to full‑time employees, which includes comprehensive health, dental and vision plans; a superior 401(k) plan, various paid time off programs; employee discount/perks; life insurance; disability insurance; flexible spending accounts; and an employee referral bonus program. This job will be posted for a minimum of 5 days. While at Sephora, you’ll enjoy… The people. You will be surrounded by some of the most talented leaders and teams – people you can be proud to work with. The learning. We invest in training and developing our teams, and you will continue evolving and building your skills through personalized career plans. The culture. As a leading beauty retailer within the LVMH family, our reach is broad, and our impact is global. It is in our DNA to innovate and, at Sephora, all 40,000 passionate team members across 35 markets and 3,000+ stores, are united by a common goal - to reimagine the future of beauty. You can unleash your creativity, because we’ve got disruptive spirit. You can learn and evolve, because we empower you to be your best. You can be yourself, because you are what sets us apart. This, is the future of beauty. Reimagine your future, at Sephora. Sephora is an equal opportunity employer and values diversity at our company. We do not discriminate on the basis of race, religion, color, national origin, ancestry, citizenship, gender, gender identity, sexual orientation, age, marital status, military/veteran status, or disability status. Sephora is committed to working with and providing reasonable accommodation to applicants with physical and mental disabilities. Sephora will consider for employment all qualified applicants with criminal histories in a manner consistent with applicable law. #J-18808-Ljbffr