Applied AI Researcher, Post-Training

What We Are Looking for

At Distyl we’re pushing the envelope of AI utilization in enterprise. This requires creative researchers who don’t just want to drive incremental improvements on benchmarks or optimize an existing process but instead are looking to creatively redefine how software is used.

Our researchers come from many academic backgrounds but have strong research track records, operate in an AI-native way, and would be bored staying on the rails of a traditional research org.

Key Responsibilities

• The Post-Training team focuses on adapting foundation models to real-world performance and alignment requirements. Researchers develop and evaluate techniques such as supervised fine-tuning, preference optimization (DPO, RLHF, RLAIF), and continual adaptation to align models with Distyl’s enterprise systems. The goal is to bridge raw model capability with trustworthy, contextually aligned system behavior
• Researchers in Post-Training investigate new methods for aligning large models with human and system-level objectives. They explore trade-offs between generalization and specialization, data efficiency and robustness, capability and controllability. Their work informs how Distyl leverages foundation models safely, effectively, and at scale across industries

What We Require

• Deep Understanding of Post-training Techniques: Familiarity with supervised fine-tuning, preference optimization (RLHF/DPO), LoRA/PEFT, and instruction-tuning pipelines.
• Experience Adapting Frontier Models: You’ve tuned or adapted LLMs/SLMs to specialized domains or behaviors through data curation, reward modeling, or continual pretraining.
• Experience Building with Models, Not Just Building Models: We develop intelligent systems using models rather than training or fine-tuning them. Ideal candidates have expertise in compound AI systems, agentic collaboration, and associated techniques (ensembling, ReAct, graph-of-thoughts, etc.).
• Proven Track Record of Research Results: Whether you’ve published in top journals, posted amazing work on twitter, or somewhere else we want to see what you've done.
• Uses AI Every Day: Before you can revolutionize someone else’s workflow, you need to revolutionize yours. You should be using tools like ChatGPT, Cursor, and Perplexity to accelerate your workflow.
• Strong Programming and Data Analysis Skills: While you might not consider yourself a software engineer you need to be able to build prototypes of your ideas and then perform the experiments to prove the effectiveness to a F500 Head of AI.
• Biases Towards Showing vs Telling: Our customers want to see the power of AI today vs discuss the most elegant idea that will take 5 years to realize.

What We Offer

• The base salary range for this role is $150K - $250K, depending on experience, location, and level. In addition to base compensation, this role is eligible for meaningful equity, along with a comprehensive benefits package
• 100% coverage of medical, dental, and vision insurance for employee and dependents
• Flexible time off
• Retirement and financial planning benefits, including access to pre-tax HSA, FSA, and commuter accounts, 401(k), and financial coaching resources
• Comprehensive wellness benefits, including physical fitness, mental well-being, and fertility and family-building benefits through Carrot
• Complimentary in-office lunches and snacks provided
• Access to state-of-the-art AI models, generous usage of modern AI tools, and real-world business problems
• Ownership of high-impact projects across top enterprises
• A mission-driven, fast-moving culture that values curiosity, pragmatism, and excellence

• Distyl has offices in San Francisco and New York. This role follows a hybrid collaboration model with 3+ days per week (Tuesday-Thursday) in-office.
• #LI-Hybrid
• We believe diverse perspectives make our work stronger and more impactful. We encourage candidates from all backgrounds to apply.