Staff Machine Learning Engineer - Visual Suite Platform (AU remote)

Company Description

Join the team redefining how the world experiences design.

Hey, g'day, mabuhay, kia ora,你好, hallo, vítejte!

Thanks for stopping by. We know job hunting can be a little time consuming and you're probably keen to find out what's on offer, so we'll get straight to the point. 

Where and how you can work

Our flagship campus is in Sydney, with a second campus in Melbourne and co-working spaces in Brisbane, Perth, & Adelaide. You have flexibility in how and where you work — whether that's from one of our spaces, from home, or a mix of both. This role is remote-friendly within Australia, so you can choose the setup that empowers you and your team to do your best work.

Job Description

About the Group/Team

We're the Productivity group within the Design Experience supergroup. We build the surfaces people use to organise and act on information in Canva: Sheets, Tables, Docs, Whiteboards, Presentations, Websites, and Email. Right now, we're focused on using AI to automate whole user flows, not just bolt on smart features. We want to invent what productivity looks like next, and rethink how the work actually gets done. We move fast and ship often, and we care about the details that make AI feel effortless. Our work touches millions of people every day, so getting it right matters.

About the Role/Specialty

This role drives AI strategy from a product perspective: identifying where ML and AI create the most value across Productivity's user journeys, and shaping how those AI-enabled experiences get built. A core current focus is toolifying existing Productivity functionality, wrapping it so LLMs and agents can use it to complete real user tasks. You will manage your time between scoping unstructured product and technical problems, setting patterns other engineers build on, partnering with product to shape where ML has impact, and mentoring engineers to raise the technical bar.

What you’ll do (responsibilities)

• Identify and drive where ML/AI creates the most value across Productivity's user journeys

• Toolify existing Productivity functionality so LLMs and agents can act on it

• Partner with product, design and other engineering teams to shape AI strategy for Productivity

• Set technical patterns and standards for how ML/AI gets applied and shipped across the team

• Unblock organisational-level technical challenges that a single team can't solve alone

• Mentor engineers and help raise the craft of applied ML engineering across the group

• Balance speed and rigour, shipping AI features that hold up at Canva's scale

• Translate shifts in user needs and the product roadmap into ML/AI priorities

• Set the AI direction for the Productivity group and empower engineers across teams to own delivery against it

What we're looking for:

You've got hands-on experience applying ML/AI to real product problems in production, and you're comfortable owning technical direction without needing everything handed to you. You're genuinely method-agnostic: as happy building a well-tuned classical model as adopting the latest technique, whatever gets the job done. You work well across teams, and you're just as happy influencing a roadmap as you are writing code. You're pragmatic: you'd rather ship something useful and iterate than chase a perfect model nobody uses. You want to find and drive where AI actually helps people get things done.

What the candidate will learn & how will they develop at Canva:

• Apply ML at the scale of Canva's global user base, where a small improvement can change how millions of people work

• Shape ML architecture and technical standards that get reused across the Design Experience supergroup

• Own increasingly ambiguous, cross-team problems and build the judgement to set technical direction, not just execute against a brief

• Mentor engineers and contribute to hiring, growing your ability to shape a team's technical bar

• Sharpen your product instincts by measuring ML work against real usage and impact, not just model performance

Additional Information

Don't tick all the boxes? Don't worry about that - nobody does!  

We’d still love to hear from you! At Canva, we know that great engineers come from a variety of backgrounds, and we value passion, curiosity, and a willingness to learn just as much as specific experience. If you're excited about this role but don’t tick every box, we encourage you to apply, you might a great fit in ways you didn’t expect!

What's in it for you?

Achieving our crazy big goals motivates us to work hard - and we do - but you'll experience lots of moments of magic, connectivity and fun woven throughout life at Canva, too. We also offer a stack of benefits to set you up for every success in and outside of work.

Here's a taste of what's on offer:

• Equity packages - we want our success to be yours too
• Inclusive parental leave policy that supports all parents & carers
• An annual Vibe & Thrive allowance to support your wellbeing, social connection, office setup & more
• Flexible leave options that empower you to be a force for good, take time to recharge and supports you personally

Check out  lifeatcanva.com for more info.

Other stuff to know

We make hiring decisions based on your experience, skills and passion, as well as how you can enhance Canva and our culture. When you apply, please tell us the pronouns you use and any reasonable adjustments you may need during the interview process.

All interviews are conducted virtually