- Employment Type: full time continuing role as a Senior Agentic Automation Engineer
- Starting Salary $148012-157056 plus generous superannuation and leave loading
- Location: Kensington campus in NSW (Hybrid Flexible Working) 2-3 days in the office
About UNSW:
UNSW isn’t like other places you’ve worked. We’re a large organisation with a diverse and talented community; a community doing extraordinary things. Together, we are driven to be thoughtful, practical, and purposeful in all we do. Taking this combined approach is what makes our work matter. It’s the reason we’re one of the top 50 universities in the world and a member of Australia’s prestigious Group of Eight. If you want a career where you can thrive, be challenged and do meaningful work, you’re in the right place.
UNSW IT is evolving rapidly to leverage AI and automation to transform operations, enhance services, and unlock new capabilities across the University. The Senior Agentic Automation Engineer plays a pivotal role in this transformation by combining technical curiosity, adaptable problem-solving, and strong stakeholder engagement to design and deliver practical AI-driven solutions. Rather than specialising narrowly in any one technology, this role is ideal for someone who thrives in a fast-changing AI landscape. They understand modern AI concepts, can build agentic systems, and are comfortable exploring new tools, frameworks, and platforms. They bring strong IT fundamentals, a learning mindset, and the enthusiasm to figure things out, even when answers don't yet exist. The role works closely with cross-functional teams in the AIM group and UNSW IT to deliver AI and automation capabilities across Copilot Studio, Power Platform, and emerging AI tooling. They help shape solution strategies, understand business needs, and translate ambiguous problems into practical, value-driven outcomes. This position reports to the Digital Process Automation Lead and has no direct reports.
Specific accountabilities for this role include:
- Provide strategic guidance on the design, development and adoption of AI, agentic automation and digital assistants across UNSW, ensuring alignment with University and Division of Operations priorities.
- Shape solution approaches by translating complex, ambiguous business challenges into clear problem statements and practical, value-driven automation strategies.
- Lead the end-to-end design of AI-enabled and Power Platform solutions, ensuring they are scalable, secure and grounded in sound engineering and data principles.
- Build and iterate prototypes and proofs-of-concept to validate ideas, then guide their evolution into stable, enterprise-ready solutions.
- Apply strong systems thinking to analyse processes, data flows, technical constraints and integration points across UNSW systems, platforms and APIs.
- Oversee the development of reusable components, patterns and accelerators that uplift capability across the AIM team and broader community.
- Continuously scan and evaluate emerging AI technologies, frameworks and patterns; assess their applicability to UNSW and recommend responsible adoption pathways.
- Experiment with new AI capabilities (e.g., agents, orchestrations, retrieval patterns) and share insights to inform strategic direction and uplift the University’s digital maturity.
- Build strong relationships with stakeholders across IT and the business, facilitating discussions that clarify needs and shape well-defined solution approaches.
- Communicate complex technical concepts clearly to both executive and operational audiences, influencing decision-making and driving confidence in AI-enabled delivery.
- Act as a trusted advisor promoting the safe, ethical, and human-centred use of AI and automation, ensuring solutions follow governance, guardrails and best practices for data privacy, accuracy, bias, and risk management.
- Lead communities of practice, training and capability-building initiatives that uplift AI and automation skills across UNSW IT and the wider University.
- Mentor team members and peers, sharing knowledge, patterns and ways of working that enhance delivery quality and consistency.
Who you are:
- Demonstrated ability to design and deliver high-quality AI, automation or digital solutions with a strong sense of ownership, accountability and craftsmanship.
- Strong problem-solving capability, able to work confidently in ambiguous environments and shape clarity, direction and practical outcomes.
- Excellent stakeholder engagement skills, with the ability to build trust, guide decision-making and communicate complex concepts clearly to both technical and non-technical audiences.
- Strong business acumen, with the ability to balance value, feasibility, risk and organisational priorities when shaping solution approaches.
- Solid understanding of contemporary AI concepts including large language models, agentic systems, prompt engineering, orchestrations, tool-use and retrieval patterns.
- Extensive Experience working with one or more relevant platforms or technologies, such as: Copilot Studio o Power Automate / Power Apps, Power BI and semantic data models, Dataverse or relational databases, APIs, REST/JSON integrations
- Python, C#, JavaScript or similar languages (advantageous but not essential)
- Familiarity with Azure services and cloud-based solution design (beneficial but not mandatory where strong learning capability is demonstrated).
- Sound understanding of structured data practices, including schemas, modelling, transformation patterns, governance and secure data access.
- Experience in a technical or analytical role involving automation, software development, data engineering, systems analysis or similar disciplines.
- Proven experience engaging directly with stakeholders to understand needs, co-design solutions and deliver measurable business impact.
- Demonstrated ability to quickly learn new tools and work effectively across multiple platforms and technologies.
- Deep curiosity and willingness to rapidly learn new AI tools, frameworks and emerging technologies, with a proven ability to apply new knowledge in practical, real-world scenarios.
- Commitment to UNSW’s values, objectives and relevant policies.
- Understanding of health & safety responsibilities and willingness to undertake required training.
Benefits and Culture
- Flexible Working Options (work from home, flexible hours etc)
- Career development opportunities
- 17% Superannuation contributions and additional leave loading payments
- Additional 3 days of leave over Christmas period
- Discounts and entitlements (retail, education, fitness)
For further details on the benefits, please visit https://www.jobs.unsw.edu.au/lifestyle-benefits
How to Apply: please apply through the portal, we would like you to submit a full application including resume and addressing the who you are section.
Applications close: Monday 27th of April at 11.30pm
Pre-Employment Checks
Aligned with UNSW’s focus on cultivating a workplace defined by safety, ethical conduct, and strong integrity preferred candidates will be required to participate in a combination of pre-employment checks relevant to the role they have applied for.
These pre-employment checks may include a combination of some of the following checks:-
- National and International Criminal history checks
- Entitlement to work and ID checks
- Working With Children Checks
- Completion of a Gender-Based Violence Prevention Declaration
- Verification of relevant qualifications
- Verification of relevant professional membership
- Employment history and reference checks
- Financial responsibility assessments/checks.
- Medical Checks and Assessments
Compliance with the necessary combination of these checks is a condition of employment at UNSW.
Get in Touch:
Jen MacLachlan
j.maclachlan@unsw.edu.au
Talent Acquisition Partner – UNSW IT
Please apply through the application portal and not via the contact above.
UNSW is committed to equity diversity and inclusion. Applications from women, people of culturally and linguistically diverse backgrounds, those living with disabilities, members of the LGBTIQ+ community; and people of Aboriginal and Torres Strait Islander descent, are encouraged. UNSW provides workplace adjustments for people with disability, and access to flexible work options for eligible staff. The University reserves the right not to proceed with any appointment.
