Director, Research Engineering - CoCounsel For Tax

Director, Research Engineering – CoCounsel For Tax

Are you excited about working at the forefront of applied AI research in an industry setting? Thomson Reuters Labs in North America is seeking a seasoned engineering Director to lead a team of high performing research engineers and to guide delivery of cutting-edge AI solutions from concept to production.  

What does Thomson Reuters Labs do? We experiment, we build, we deliver. We support the organization and our customers through applied research in informational retrieval, natural language processing and machine learning. We work closely with product and domain experts to identify compelling solutions at the intersection of user need and technical feasibility. Our team is responsible for designing the next generation of tax, accounting and audit compliance software for Tax Professionals and Corporates in the US, and across the global markets. We own AI innovation for Thomson Reuters’ core tax products, including Cloud Audit Suite, SurePrep, Materia and ONESOURCE. 

The Labs Tax & Corporates team is seeking an experienced software leader and manager to direct research engineering work in CoCounsel for Tax, Accounting and Audit which is formed around the recent acquisition of the startup Materia. Cocounsel for Tax provides LLM and agent driven experiences to automate workflow steps in tax preparation, tax research, advisory and audit. The successful candidate will work with the team to further push the envelope of agentic AI as well as information retrieval & RAG systems.  

About the Role:

In this opportunity as an Director, Research Engineering  you will:  

Lead:  

• You will lead and structure a high performing team of 15+ research engineers, setting clear expectations, modeling expected behaviors and actively coaching. 
• You will be a proactive communicator who is excited to share their work and even more excited to highlight the accomplishments of their team. 
• You will work directly with customers as well as with TR product and technology leaders to shape the future of CoCounsel for Tax, Accounting and Audit. 

Deliver: 

• With a sense of urgency and the desire to work in a fast-paced, dynamic environment, you will enable your team to solve complex business problems and build solutions with clearly defined outcomes. 
• You will drive the end-to-end model development lifecycle partnering effectively with a collaborative cross-functional team. 
• You will help our partners operate and maintain AI systems with operational excellency 

Innovate: 

• You will be empowered to try new approaches, learn new technologies, and take informed risks with good judgement. Furthermore, you will encourage and empower your team to do the same. 
• You will foster innovative ideas to solve real-world challenges. You will help lead the way in growing the understanding and adoption of AI/ML research engineering practices and frameworks across the enterprise. 
• Have oversight on multiple large projects and initiatives across multiple key TR product lines in Tax & Accounting 
• Collaborate directly with leaders in product management, product marketing, engineering, editorial and UX to prioritize and deliver on key initiatives and continuously improve ways of working 
• Manage the project portfolio, the budget, the priorities, and the staff allocation 
• Confidently present our work to customers and other external venues 

About You

You are a fit for the position of Director, Research Engineering if your background includes:

Required qualifications:

• A Bachelor's degree in information technology, computer science, or the equivalent. A Master’s or PhD in a relevant specialization is preferred. 
• 10+ years software development experience, of which at least 3 years working on Machine Learning related products and solutions 
• 5+ years of management experience – coaching & developing high-performing teams, with the demonstrated ability to successfully manage software engineering teams in an agile environment 
• Demonstrated experience with integrating machine learning solutions to production-grade software 
• Experience spearheading technical development in a cross-functional setting, with responsibility for ML applications; close partnership with Applied Scientists, R&D groups, or similar. 
• Experience contributing to and overseeing large-scale rollouts and infrastructure initiatives.  
• Experience designing and implementing solutions with large language models, including RAG frameworks and agentic frameworks (langgraph, langchain, haystack, etc) 
• Expertise in several of the following areas: robust Python development, libraries such as Numpy, Scipy, Pandas, Dask, spaCy, NLTK, scikit-learn, MLOps, containerization, cloud infrastructure (AWS or Azure), advanced search and recommendation technology, orchestration of ML pipelines for real-time inference, microservices architecture, model monitoring and governance.  

Preferred qualifications:  

• 8+ years of management experience – coaching & developing high-performing teams  
• Previous exposure to Natural Language Processing (NLP) problems and are familiar with key tasks such as Named Entity Recognition (NER), Information Extraction, Information Retrieval, etc. 
• Hands-on experience in other programming and scripting languages (Java, TypeScript, JavaScript, etc.) 

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What’s in it For You?

• Flexibility & Work-Life Balance: Flex My Way is a set of supportive workplace policies designed to help manage personal and professional responsibilities, whether caring for family, giving back to the community, or finding time to refresh and reset. This builds upon our flexible work arrangements, including work from anywhere for up to 8 weeks per year, empowering employees to achieve a better work-life balance.

• Career Development and Growth: By fostering a culture of continuous learning and skill development, we prepare our talent to tackle tomorrow’s challenges and deliver real-world solutions. Our Grow My Way programming and skills-first approach ensures you have the tools and knowledge to grow, lead, and thrive in an AI-enabled future.

• Industry Competitive Benefits: We offer comprehensive benefit plans to include flexible vacation, two company-wide Mental Health Days off, access to the Headspace app, retirement savings, tuition reimbursement, employee incentive programs, and resources for mental, physical, and financial wellbeing.

• Culture: Globally recognized, award-winning reputation for inclusion and belonging, flexibility, work-life balance, and more. We live by our values: Obsess over our Customers, Compete to Win, Challenge (Y)our Thinking, Act Fast / Learn Fast, and Stronger Together.

• Social Impact: Make an impact in your community with our Social Impact Institute. We offer employees two paid volunteer days off annually and opportunities to get involved with pro-bono consulting projects and Environmental, Social, and Governance (ESG) initiatives.

• Making a Real-World Impact: We are one of the few companies globally that helps its customers pursue justice, truth, and transparency. Together, with the professionals and institutions we serve, we help uphold the rule of law, turn the wheels of commerce, catch bad actors, report the facts, and provide trusted, unbiased information to people all over the world.

About Us

Thomson Reuters informs the way forward by bringing together the trusted content and technology that people and organizations need to make the right decisions. We serve professionals across legal, tax, accounting, compliance, government, and media. Our products combine highly specialized software and insights to empower professionals with the data, intelligence, and solutions needed to make informed decisions, and to help institutions in their pursuit of justice, truth, and transparency. Reuters, part of Thomson Reuters, is a world leading provider of trusted journalism and news.

We are powered by the talents of 26,000 employees across more than 70 countries, where everyone has a chance to contribute and grow professionally in flexible work environments. At a time when objectivity, accuracy, fairness, and transparency are under attack, we consider it our duty to pursue them. Sound exciting? Join us and help shape the industries that move society forward.

As a global business, we rely on the unique backgrounds, perspectives, and experiences of all employees to deliver on our business goals. To ensure we can do that, we seek talented, qualified employees in all our operations around the world regardless of race, color, sex/gender, including pregnancy, gender identity and expression, national origin, religion, sexual orientation, disability, age, marital status, citizen status, veteran status, or any other protected classification under applicable law. Thomson Reuters is proud to be an Equal Employment Opportunity Employer providing a drug-free workplace.

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