Staff Research Engineer, Voice – Speech

Decagon

Voice Research Engineer leading development of models and algorithms for real-time voice agents. Driving production initiatives for speech understanding and naturalness in AI solutions.

Posted 5/18/2026full-timeNew York City • New York • 🇺🇸 United StatesLead💰 $200,000 - $400,000 per yearWebsite

Tech Stack

Tools & technologies

Python

About the role

Key responsibilities & impact

Lead research and engineering efforts to improve core conversational capabilities in production, including instruction following, retrieval, memory, and long-horizon task completion
Build and iterate on end-to-end models and pipelines that optimize for quality, efficiency, and user experience
Partner with platform and product engineers to integrate new models into production systems
Break down ambiguous research ideas into clear, iterative milestones and roadmaps.
Mentor other researchers/engineers, set technical direction, and establish best practices for applied research and engineering

Requirements

What you’ll need

8+ years of experience in AI/ML engineering or research.
Prior experience post-training and deploying LLMs in production environments.
Fluency in Python and modern ML tooling (training, evaluation, data pipelines)
Track record of taking research ideas from prototype → reliable, measurable production impact
Ability to define a roadmap, break ambiguity into milestones, and lead cross-functional execution

Benefits

Comp & perks

Take what you need vacation policy (subject to local requirements; UK employees receive 25 days of statutory leave)
Medical, Dental, and Vision benefits for you and your family
Life Insurance and Disability Benefits
Retirement Plan (e.g., 401K, pension)
Parental Leave
Fertility and family building benefits through Carrot
Daily lunches and snacks in the office to keep you at your best

ATS Keywords

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Applicant Tracking System Keywords

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Hard Skills & Tools

AI engineeringML engineeringLLMs deploymentPythondata pipelinesmodel trainingmodel evaluationproduction systemsend-to-end modelstask completion

Soft Skills

leadershipmentoringtechnical directioncommunicationproblem-solvingroadmap definitioncross-functional executionmilestone settingiterative developmentbest practices establishment