Lead Engineer - AI Agents

Job title : Lead Engineer - AI Agents

About the Job

• We're hiring our first Lead Engineer - AI Agents to lead a team that designs, ships, and scales automations and AI agents across M-KOPA. 
• This is a brand-new team within the business - the tech foundation is already proven, and now we need someone to lead it, scale it, and define what it becomes.

The Impact 

• Your production-grade automations and agents will directly improve how 2,300+ employees work across our global operations. 
• We've already helped over 10 million customers access over $2 billion in credit - and the tools you build will help that mission scale further and faster. 
• It's your chance to be part of something that's literally transforming lives across an entire continent.

The Opportunity

• Mission-driven engineering: Every automation you build helps internal teams and customer-facing staff deliver financial inclusion to Africa's Every Day Earners
• Global recognition: Join a company named by TIME 100 as one of the world's most influential and by the Financial Times as Africa's fastest-growing for 5 consecutive years (2022–2026)
• Scale challenges: 2,500+ employees across Kenya, Uganda, Nigeria, Ghana, South Africa, the UK, and Europe - internal teams that can't scale by hiring forever need intelligent tooling that actually works
• Environmental impact: We're carbon-negative, having displaced over 2 million tonnes of emissions

What You'll Do

• At M-KOPA, you'll lead the AI Ops Agents team from day one - owning delivery, growing the function, and proving the value. 
• You'll work daily with Claude, Claude Code, MCP, and LangChain to build production-grade agents and automations that internal teams actually use. 
• Your team builds automations and agents for internal use and serves as internal consultants, helping Software Engineering teams integrate AI into customer-facing products.

Your key responsibilities:

• Lead three AI Ops Engineers — own their delivery, development, and day-to-day work
• Prioritise efficiently — manage competing requests from multiple teams by applying a clear prioritisation framework you'll help develop and improve
• Design and ship multi-agent systems and production-grade automations that measurably improve how internal teams and customer-facing staff work
• Build RAG pipelines for internal knowledge retrieval that ground agents in real organisational context
• Keep the AI tooling stack healthy as usage scales across 2,500+ employees
• Stay current on emerging AI tools and technologies - know what's hype and what's actually useful
• Help refine AI training for the wider organisation, including Software Engineering teams.

Technical Environment:

• AI & Agentic Frameworks: Claude, Claude Code, Anthropic tooling, LangChain, LangGraph, MCP, multi-agent orchestration, Google ADK (or similar agentic tooling)
• Automation & Prototyping: Scripting, workflow tools, AI-assisted development, rapid prototyping (Vercel/Railway)
• Enterprise Tooling: Identity automation (Entra), internal platforms, Notion, HiBob integrations
• Existing Foundation: Twelve months of Claude, Claude Code, Notion, HiBob, and Entra automations already running in production — you're building on proven foundations, not starting from zero.

Our Approach:

• Build, don't just advise — this is a hands-on team that ships working automations and agents
• Prove the value, then expand — start with three engineers, demonstrate impact, grow from there
• Product-focused mindset — treat internal teams as customers and build tooling that works
• Cut through the hype — evaluate emerging AI tools on practical value, not marketing buzz.

What You Need

• We're looking for someone with a strong technical background and product-focused mindset. 
• You won't be building models - we have Data Science teams for that. 
• You'll be building multi-agent systems, shipping production-grade automations, and leading a team that makes M-KOPA's internal operations smarter and faster.

Required Experience:

• Hands-on experience building production-grade automations and AI agents — scripting, workflow tools, or AI-assisted development
• Hands-on experience building multi-agent systems using agentic frameworks — LangChain, LangGraph, MCP, Google ADK or similar
• Experience with RAG pipelines — retrieval-augmented generation for internal knowledge and workflow automation
• Background in enterprise tooling — rapid prototyping tools (Vercel/Railway), identity automation (Entra), or internal platforms
• People leadership experience — you've led or mentored engineers and can own a team's delivery and development.

Why This Role?

• This is a brand new team within the business, reporting to the Director of Security. 
• The tech stack is proven - twelve months of Claude, Claude Code, Notion, HiBob, and Entra automations already running. The team structure is what's new. 
• That's yours to shape. 
• You'll start with three engineers. 
• Prove the value. 
• Expand from there.
• The problems are complex. 2,500+ employees across Kenya, Uganda, Nigeria, Ghana, South Africa, the UK, and Europe. Internal teams that can't scale by hiring forever. Customer-facing staff who need tools that actually work.
• M-KOPA provides affordable financial and digital products to underserved communities across Africa - unlocking access to smartphones, credit, and insurance for millions of people. The automations and agents you build don't just save time internally - they help that mission reach more people.
• If you want to decide how AI actually gets used at scale across a growing fintech – this is the opportunity.

Location & Benefits

• Fully remote role within UTC -1 to UTC +3 time zones
• Work with diverse teams across UK, Europe, and Africa
• Professional development programmes and coaching partnerships
• Family-friendly policies and flexible working arrangements
• Well-being support and career growth opportunities.