AI Data Engineer Intern - QuantumBlack, AI by McKinsey
McKinsey & Company · Atlanta, United States +3 · 1d ago
InternshipOn-siteMachine Learning & AI$120k
You are eligible for this internship if your graduation date is between December 2027 and August 2028 you are pursuing an engineering degree.
Who you'll work with
Driving lasting impact and building long-term capabilities with our clients is not easy work. You are the kind of person who thrives in a high performance/high reward culture - doing hard things, picking yourself up when you stumble, and having the resilience to try another way forward.
In return for your drive, determination, and curiosity, we'll provide the resources, mentorship, and opportunities you need to become a stronger leader faster than you ever thought possible. Your colleagues—at all levels—will invest deeply in your development, just as much as they invest in delivering exceptional results for clients. Every day, you'll receive apprenticeship, coaching, and exposure that will accelerate your growth in ways you won’t find anywhere else.
When you join us, you will have:
- Continuous learning: Our learning and apprenticeship culture, backed by structured programs, is all about helping you grow while creating an environment where feedback is clear, actionable, and focused on your development. The real magic happens when you take the input from others to heart and embrace the fast-paced learning experience, owning your journey.
- A voice that matters: From day one, we value your ideas and contributions. You’ll make a tangible impact by offering innovative ideas and practical solutions, all while upholding our unwavering commitment to ethics and integrity. We not only encourage diverse perspectives, but they are critical in driving us toward the best possible outcomes.
- Global community: With colleagues across 65+ countries and over 100 different nationalities, our firm’s diversity fuels creativity and helps us come up with the best solutions for our clients. Plus, you’ll have the opportunity to learn from exceptional colleagues with diverse backgrounds and experiences.
- World-class benefits: On top of a competitive salary (based on your location, experience, and skills), we provide a comprehensive benefits package to enable holistic well-being for you and your family.
What you'll do
You will begin building the foundational skills and hands-on experience needed to design and deliver the data infrastructure that powers cutting-edge AI applications leveraging LLMs, retrieval systems, workflows, and emerging agentic architectures.
You will learn to build and maintain scalable data pipelines, contribute to secure data environments, and prepare data for AI-driven systems while collaborating with cross-functional teams and clients. You'll tackle real-world challenges by contributing to the development of next-generation AI systems and grow as a technologist by working alongside diverse experts across industries.
You will contribute to the design and development of scalable, reproducible data components essential for machine learning, agentic, and autonomous AI systems. You'll map data landscapes, apply data quality fundamentals, and help prepare data for AI solutions. Additionally, you'll begin to develop familiarity with generative AI and agentic frameworks, contribute to secure data environments, and support R&D initiatives focused on innovating and scaling next-generation AI capabilities.
Your work will help solve some of the most complex and high-impact challenges facing clients across industries. Collaborating across QuantumBlack, AI by McKinsey and QuantumBlack Labs teams, you'll help develop innovative AI capabilities and scalable enterprise solutions. You'll help build robust data foundations for scalable, production-ready AI systems. Your contributions will directly support the firm's ability to accelerate AI adoption, solve complex business problems at scale, and enable clients to achieve meaningful, lasting impact.
You'll be based in Atlanta, Boston, Chicago or New York for a 10-week internship during the summer of 2027 as part of our global Data Engineering community. Working in cross-functional Agile teams, you'll collaborate closely with Data Scientists, Machine Learning Engineers, and industry experts to deliver AI solutions. By partnering with clients from data owners to C-level executives, you'll help solve complex problems that drive tangible business value and begin to build your skills as a client-facing technologist.
Your work offers a unique opportunity to grow at the forefront of AI, data engineering, and emerging agentic technologies. You'll develop expertise at the intersection of technology and business by tackling diverse challenges in the evolving AI landscape. Working alongside multidisciplinary teams, you'll gain a holistic understanding of how data engineering enables advanced AI while collaborating with leading AI and data experts in the industry.
Your background
- Upcoming graduation between December 2027-August 2028 with a degree in an engineering discipline
- Experience in a data-focused role, including internships or academic projects
- Ability to write clean, well-documented code with a strong preference for Python and SQL, with a growing understanding of software engineering best practices such as modular code and version control
- Interest in or exposure to data engineering in the context of Agentic AI, Generative AI, or Machine Learning across different data formats and processing methods
- Familiarity with commonly used data platforms such as Databricks, Snowflake, BigQuery, or similar; cloud platforms (AWS, Azure, or GCP); and foundational engineering tools such as Pandas, dbt, or LangChain
- Exposure to basic data governance, security practices, and version control using Git
- Developing familiarity with generative AI tools and simple agentic AI frameworks, with an eagerness to learn how LLMs can be applied to automate defined tasks
- Exceptional time management in a complex and largely autonomous work environment
- Strong communication skills, both verbal and written, in English and local office language(s)