Staff, Software Engineer - Machine Learning

Staff Machine Learning Engineer

We are looking for a Staff Machine Learning Engineer to lead the development of intelligent ranking systems that power personalized shopping experiences across our e-commerce platform. This role is ideal for someone who combines deep technical expertise in machine learning and neural networks with a passion for building scalable platforms and collaborating closely with data scientists.

You will play a key role in shaping the architecture of our ranking and retrieval systems, enabling rapid experimentation and continuous improvement in relevance, engagement, and conversion.

About Team: Focusing on customer, associate and business needs, this team works with Walmart International, which includes more than 5,200 retail units, operating in 23 countries such as Canada, Central America, Chile, China, India, Mexico and South Africa to name a few.

What you'll do:

• Lead the design, development, and deployment of ranking models using both traditional and deep learning approaches.
• Collaborate with data scientists to translate research into production-ready models and build tools to accelerate experimentation.
• Architect and evolve the ranking experimentation platform, including offline evaluation, online A/B testing, and real-time inference.
• Build and optimize embedding-based retrieval systems using vector similarity search and representation learning.
• Drive the adoption of neural ranking models, including transformers and multi-task learning frameworks.
• Mentor engineers and contribute to the technical vision and roadmap for ML infrastructure and ranking systems.

What you'll bring:

• 10+ years of experience in software engineering, with 5+ years in machine learning or applied ML systems.
• Proven experience building and deploying ranking, recommendation, or search systems at scale.
• Strong programming skills in Python, Java, or Scala, and experience with ML frameworks like TensorFlow, PyTorch, or JAX.
• Deep understanding of learning-to-rank (LTR), embedding models, and neural IR techniques.
• Experience with vector databases (e.g., FAISS, Milvus, Weaviate, Pinecone) and approximate nearest neighbor (ANN) search.
• Familiarity with transformer architectures (e.g., BERT, T5, DistilBERT) and representation learning.
• Experience with feature stores, model monitoring, and ML Ops best practices.
• Experience in e-commerce, retail, or large-scale consumer platforms.
• Familiarity with multi-objective optimization, multi-armed bandits, or causal inference in ranking.
• Experience building internal ML platforms or tooling for model lifecycle management.
• Strong communication and leadership skills, with a track record of cross-functional collaboration.

About Walmart Global Tech: Imagine working in an environment where one line of code can make life easier for hundreds of millions of people. That's what we do at Walmart Global Tech. We are a team of software engineers, data scientists, cybersecurity experts and service professionals within the world's leading retailer who make an epic impact and are at the forefront of the next retail disruption. People are why we innovate, and people power our innovations. We are people-led and tech-empowered. We train our team in the skillsets of the future and bring in experts like you to help us grow. We have roles for those chasing their first opportunity as well as those looking for the opportunity that will define their career. Here, you can kickstart a great career in tech, gain new skills and experience for virtually every industry, or leverage your expertise to innovate at scale, impact millions and reimagine the future of retail.

Flexible, hybrid work: We use a hybrid way of working that is primarily in office coupled with virtual when not onsite. Our campuses serve as a hub to enhance collaboration, bring us together for purpose and deliver on business needs. This approach helps us make quicker decisions, remove location barriers across our global team and be more flexible in our personal lives.

Benefits: Beyond our great compensation package, you can receive incentive awards for your performance. Other great perks include 401(k) match, stock purchase plan, paid maternity and parental leave, PTO, multiple health plans, and much more. Equal Opportunity Employer: Walmart, Inc. is an Equal Opportunity Employer By Choice. We believe we are best equipped to help our associates, customers and the communities we serve live better when we really know them. That means understanding, respecting and valuing unique styles, experiences, identities, ideas and opinions while being welcoming of all people.

Minimum Qualifications: Option 1: Bachelor’s degree in computer science, computer engineering, computer information systems, software engineering, or related area and 4 years’ experience in software engineering or related area. Option 2: 6 years’ experience in software engineering or related area.

Preferred Qualifications: Master’s degree in Computer Science, Computer Engineering, Computer Information Systems, Software Engineering, or related area and 2 years’ experience in software engineering or related area, We value candidates with a background in creating inclusive digital experiences, demonstrating knowledge in implementing Web Content Accessibility Guidelines (WCAG) 2.2 AA standards, assistive technologies, and integrating digital accessibility seamlessly. The ideal candidate would have knowledge of accessibility best practices and join us as we continue to create accessible products and services following Walmart's accessibility standards and guidelines for supporting an inclusive culture.

Primary Location: 640 W California Avenue, Sunnyvale, CA 94086-4828, United States of America