AI First Software Designer / Agentic Systems Builder

Battelle delivers when others can't. We conduct research and development, manage national laboratories, design and manufacture products and deliver critical services for our clients-whether they are a multi-national corporation, a small start-up or a government agency.

We recognize and appreciate the value and contributions of individuals from a wide range of backgrounds and experiences and welcome all qualified individuals to apply.

Job Summary

Battelle is hiring a non-traditional software designer whose primary development workflow is AI-driven. This role is for someone who treats large language models, agentic coding systems, and automated tooling as their default way of building software-using human effort for design judgment, system thinking, and direction rather than manual implementation.

This position supports fast-moving, IRAD-style projects where the goal is to explore how far AI-assisted software development can be pushed to rapidly deliver internal tools, prototypes, and operational systems with meaningful impact.

What You'll Do

• Design and ship software primarily through AI tools (LLMs, coding agents, copilots), moving from concept to working systems in days-or hours-rather than weeks.
• Translate ambiguous ideas and mission needs into clear prompts, agent workflows, and system architectures that produce high-quality code
• Rapidly prototype and deploy internal tools that support research, analysis, and mission programs (often under aggressive timelines).
• Exercise strong software design judgment-recognizing good architecture, maintainability, and failure modes even when code is AI-generated.
• Iterate quickly: generate, test, refine, discard, and rebuild without attachment to traditional development rituals.
• Collaborate with technical teams who are already using AI heavily and help raise the organization's ceiling on agentic and AI-accelerated development practices.

What Makes This Role Different

• You are not expected to write most code by hand
• Your value comes from:
• Prompt engineering and task decomposition
• System-level thinking
• Taste and judgment about software quality
• Knowing when AI output is good enough-and when it isn't
• You may ship "simple" tools that nonetheless deliver outsized impact because they're delivered fast and used immediately

Key Qualifications

• Demonstrated experience using AI tools as your primary coding interface (LLMs, copilots, agentic coding systems, or similar)
• Strong intuition for software design, even if your background is non-traditional (research, linguistics, data science, physics, ops, etc.)
• Ability to move from idea deployed tool extremely quickly (on the order of tens of hours, not months)
• Comfort working in ambiguous problem spaces with minimal upfront specification
• Willingness to experiment, fail fast, and iterate

Preferred Qualifications

• Experience with agentic coding workflows or autonomous coding systems
• Prior work shipping internal tools, research software, or mission-driven systems under tight deadlines
• Familiarity with government, defense, or applied research environments
• Active U.S. security clearance (or eligibility to obtain one)

What Success Looks Like

• You help Battelle demonstrate what's possible when AI-first development is taken seriously
• Small teams ship multiple useful tools in short timeframes
• Others begin adopting your workflows because they work
• Leadership can clearly point to concrete examples where AI-driven software delivery changed speed, cost, or capability

Benefits: Live an Extraordinary Life
We care about your well-being, not just on the job. Battelle offers comprehensive and competitive benefits to help you live your best life.

• Balance life through a compressed work schedule: Most of our team follows a flexible, compressed work schedule that allows for every other Friday off-giving you a dedicated day to accomplish things in your personal life without using vacation time.
• Enjoy enhanced work flexibility, including a hybrid arrangement: You have options for where and when you work. Our Together with Flexibility model allows you to work 60% in-office and 40% remote, with Monday and Tuesday as common in-office days, dependent on team and position needs.
• Take time to recharge: You get paid time off to support work-life balance and keep motivated.
• Prioritize wellness: Stay healthy with medical, dental, and vision coverage with wellness incentives and benefits plus a variety of optional supplemental benefits.
• Better together: Coverage for partners, gender-affirming care and health support, and family formation support.
• Build your financial future: Build financial stability with an industry-leading 401(k) retirement savings plan. For most employees, we put in 5 percent whether you contribute or not, and match your contributions on top of that.
• Advance your education: Tuition assistance is available to pursue higher education.

A Work Environment Where You Succeed
For brilliant minds in science, technology, engineering and business operations, Battelle is the place to do the greatest good by solving humanity's most pressing challenges and creating a safer, healthier and more secure world.

You will have the opportunity to thrive in a culture that inspires you to:

• Apply your talent to challenging and meaningful projects
• Receive select funding to pursue ideas in scientific and technological discovery
• Partner with world-class experts in a collaborative environment
• Nurture and develop the next generation of scientific leaders
• Give back to and improve our communities

Battelle is an equal opportunity employer. We provide employment and opportunities for advancement, compensation, training, and growth according to individual merit, without regard to race, color, religion, sex (including pregnancy), national origin, sexual orientation, gender identity or expression, marital status, age, genetic information, disability, veteran-status veteran or military status, or any other characteristic protected under applicable Federal, state, or local law. Our goal is for each staff member to have the opportunity to grow to the limits of their abilities and to achieve personal and organizational objectives. We will support positive programs for equal treatment of all staff and full utilization of all qualified employees at all levels within Battelle.