Conversational AI Engineer Jobs in USA with Visa Sponsorship
Conversational AI Engineers are in high demand from U.S. employers willing to sponsor H-1B visa, O-1 visa, and EB-1 visas. The role qualifies as a specialty occupation, and LCA filings for AI engineering positions have grown sharply over the past two years. For detailed occupation requirements, see the O*NET profile.
Find Conversational AI Engineer JobsOverview
Showing 5 of 18,968+ Conversational AI Engineer jobs










See all 18,968+ Conversational AI Engineer Jobs
Sign up for free to unlock all listings, filter by visa type, and get alerts for new Conversational AI Engineer roles.
Get Access To All Jobs
INTRODUCTION
Optum is a global organization that delivers care, aided by technology to help millions of people live healthier lives. The work you do with our team will directly improve health outcomes by connecting people with the care, pharmacy benefits, data and resources they need to feel their best. Here, you will find a culture guided by inclusion, talented peers, comprehensive benefits and career development opportunities. Come make an impact on the communities we serve as you help us advance health optimization on a global scale. Join us to start Caring. Connecting. Growing together.
As a Senior Conversational AI Designer within Optum's Enterprise Digital Product Office, you will serve as the primary design expert collaborating with product and engineering teams to craft exceptional conversational experiences. You'll leverage your expertise to anticipate customer needs and intents while proactively developing intuitive dialogue strategies that feel natural and seamless.
You'll enjoy the flexibility to work remotely * from anywhere within the U.S. as you take on some tough challenges.
For all hires in the Minneapolis or Washington, D.C. area, you will be required to work in the office a minimum of four days per week.
PRIMARY RESPONSIBILITIES:
- Dialogue Design Excellence: Create conversational flows that anticipate user goals, craft multi-turn interactions handling various user intents and edge cases and develop responses that feel human, clear and aligned with brand voice
- AI Prompt Engineering: Craft, test and iterate prompts that elicit high-quality responses from LLMs across diverse use cases, influencing system instructions with precise engineering requirements to guide AI behavior in context-aware, multi-turn interactions
- Responsive Interaction Design: Develop error handling and recovery strategies that gracefully manage AI misunderstandings while maintaining user trust and experience quality
- Multimodal Experience Integration: Design seamless experiences that thoughtfully integrate voice, visual and text elements to enhance user engagement and support solutions
- Analytics-Driven Optimization: Utilize conversation data to identify enhancement opportunities, refine flows and measurably improve business metrics
- Cross-Functional Leadership: Act as design subject matter expert for product and engineering teams to ensure cohesive implementation of user experiences
- NLU Curation: Partner with engineering teams on interaction modeling and NLU curation to define and enhance model performance
- Ethical & Inclusive Design: Ensure conversations are accessible to diverse audiences while addressing privacy concerns, minimizing bias and maintaining transparency in AI interactions
Your work will directly impact the members we serve by delivering AI-powered designs that meet the highest standards of accessibility, health literacy and conversational design best practices.
You'll be rewarded and recognized for your performance in an environment that will challenge you and give you clear direction on what it takes to succeed in your role as well as provide development for other roles you may be interested in.
REQUIRED QUALIFICATIONS:
- 4+ years of hands-on experience designing highly complex chat and voice conversational experiences OR working with a writing discipline or digital product team
- 1+ years of hands-on experience designing innovative conversational AI solutions
- Proven knowledge of LLMs, bot platforms and prompt engineering best practices
- Proven adept at crafting conversations and logic that align to the strategy while following voice, tone and brand standards
- Demonstrated ability to partner with engineering, product and business stakeholders to translate insights into conversational solutions
- Proven record of displaying ownership through problem solving and decision-making skills
- Proven digital portfolio or work samples of relevant AI/conversational projects
All employees working remotely will be required to adhere to UnitedHealth Group's Telecommuter Policy.
Pay is based on several factors including but not limited to local labor markets, education, work experience, certifications, etc. In addition to your salary, we offer benefits such as, a comprehensive benefits package, incentive and recognition programs, equity stock purchase and 401k contribution (all benefits are subject to eligibility requirements). No matter where or when you begin a career with us, you'll find a far-reaching choice of benefits and incentives. The salary for this role will range from $91,700 - $163,700 annually based on full-time employment. We comply with all minimum wage laws as applicable.
APPLICATION DEADLINE: This will be posted for a minimum of 2 business days or until a sufficient candidate pool has been collected. Job posting may come down early due to volume of applicants.
At UnitedHealth Group, our mission is to help people live healthier lives and make the health system work better for everyone. We believe everyone - of every race, gender, sexuality, age, location and income - deserves the opportunity to live their healthiest life. Today, however, there are still far too many barriers to good health which are disproportionately experienced by people of color, historically marginalized groups and those with lower incomes. We are committed to mitigating our impact on the environment and enabling and delivering equitable care that addresses health disparities and improves health outcomes - an enterprise priority reflected in our mission.
UnitedHealth Group is an Equal Employment Opportunity employer under applicable law and qualified applicants will receive consideration for employment without regard to race, national origin, religion, age, color, sex, sexual orientation, gender identity, disability, or protected veteran status, or any other characteristic protected by local, state, or federal laws, rules, or regulations.
UnitedHealth Group is a drug-free workplace. Candidates are required to pass a drug test before beginning employment.
UHCPJ
See all 18,968+ Conversational AI Engineer Jobs
Sign up for free to unlock all listings, filter by visa type, and get alerts for new Conversational AI Engineer roles.
Get Access To All JobsTips for Finding Visa Sponsorship as a Conversational AI Engineer
Emphasize NLP and LLM depth, not breadth
Employers sponsoring visas want specialists, not generalists. Highlight concrete work with large language models, fine-tuning pipelines, or dialogue systems. Specific technical depth makes the specialty occupation case easier for immigration counsel to build.
Target companies with active LCA filings
Companies that have filed Labor Condition Applications for AI or machine learning roles in the past 12 months are far more likely to sponsor again. Search DOL disclosure data to confirm a company's sponsorship history before investing time in an application.
Frame your degree field precisely
Computer Science, Computational Linguistics, and AI or Machine Learning degrees map cleanly to this role. If your degree is in a related field like Mathematics or Cognitive Science, document how your coursework and experience directly support conversational AI work.
Get your portfolio in GitHub-shareable format
Hiring managers for AI roles assess deployed projects, not just resumes. A public repo showing a working chatbot, voice assistant, or dialogue model signals real capability and accelerates hiring decisions, which matters when H-1B cap deadlines are involved.
Understand the H-1B lottery timeline before applying
H-1B registration opens in March for an October 1 start date. If you need sponsorship by a specific date, work backward from that deadline. Missing the registration window means waiting a full year, so timing your job search accordingly is critical.
Ask directly about sponsorship in early conversations
Many AI teams want to hire but have not yet confirmed sponsorship budget or legal counsel availability. Raising it early in the recruiting process surfaces real blockers before you invest weeks in interviews and technical assessments with no viable path forward.
Frequently Asked Questions
Does a Conversational AI Engineer role qualify as a specialty occupation for H-1B purposes?
Yes. Conversational AI Engineer roles consistently qualify as specialty occupations because they require a bachelor's degree or higher in a specific technical field such as Computer Science, Computational Linguistics, or Artificial Intelligence. USCIS has approved H-1B visa petitions for AI and NLP engineering roles at a high rate, particularly when the job description clearly requires specialized theoretical and applied knowledge in language model development or dialogue system architecture.
What visa types are realistic for Conversational AI Engineers seeking U.S. work authorization?
H-1B is the most common path, but the annual lottery creates uncertainty. O-1A is a strong alternative for engineers with published research, patents, or recognition from the AI community. Australians can use the E-3 visa, which has no lottery and a fast approval timeline. Canadian and Mexican nationals can explore the TN visa under the Computer Systems Analyst or Engineer category, depending on role specifics.
How can I find U.S. employers willing to sponsor a visa for this role?
Migrate Mate is the most direct way to find Conversational AI Engineer roles from employers actively open to visa sponsorship. Beyond that, DOL LCA disclosure data shows which companies have filed for similar roles in recent years, giving you a verifiable list of sponsorship-willing employers to prioritize in your search.
Does my degree field need to match exactly, or can related fields qualify?
An exact match is not required, but the connection needs to be defensible. Computer Science, Machine Learning, AI, and Computational Linguistics map directly to the role. Degrees in Mathematics, Electrical Engineering, or Cognitive Science can work if your coursework or graduate specialization involved natural language processing or machine learning. The weaker the field match, the more your experience and job duties need to close the gap in the H-1B petition.
Are startups realistic sponsorship options for Conversational AI Engineers, or should I focus on large companies?
Well-funded AI startups are realistic sponsors, particularly Series B and later companies building products around LLMs or voice interfaces. The key variable is whether the company has immigration counsel on retainer and a track record of completing H-1B petitions. Early-stage startups may be willing but lack the infrastructure to execute sponsorship reliably. Ask about their legal counsel and any previous sponsored employees during the interview process.
What is the prevailing wage requirement for sponsored Conversational AI Engineer jobs?
U.S. employers sponsoring a visa must pay at least the prevailing wage, which is what workers in the same role, area, and experience level typically earn. The Department of Labor sets this rate to make sure companies aren't hiring foreign workers simply because they'd accept lower pay than a U.S. worker. It varies by job title, location, and experience. You can look up current prevailing wage rates for any occupation and location using the OFLC Wage Search page.