Director, AI/ML Applied Science - Remote

About the role

Optum AI is a team within UnitedHealth Group dedicated to advancing AI/ML solutions for health care. Our team develops AI/ML solutions for various UnitedHealth Group businesses including UnitedHealthcare, Optum Financial, Optum Health, Optum Insight, and Optum Rx. We focus on improving health outcomes through responsible AI/ML innovation and developing an enterprise AI/ML development platform.

Responsibilities

• Develop novel machine learning models for prediction of health outcomes and improved care, engagement models, and other applications from both structured and unstructured data
• Develop and execute the vision for engineering platforms, and reusable code that will be used by thousands of other engineers for automation and improved efficiency of AI/ML development
• Stay up to date with latest technologies and literature recommending solutions to improve business goals
• Mentor data scientists, AI/ML scientists, and engineers to ensure the delivery of the AI/ML projects, and provide guidance on how to best use specific tools or technologies to achieve the desired results
• Collaborate with cross-functional teams to determine applicability of AI to business problems
• Closely collaborate with the Responsible Use of AI (RUAI) team to ensure that the delivered solutions are compliant with the company policies and standards
• Write both internal and external documentation of the novel algorithms, including patents and publications in machine learning and other scientific conferences and journals as well as infrastructure design and deployment procedures
• Evangelize the benefits of the AI models and platforms built in our team to drive adoption for employees and functional roles across the UHG enterprise including technology, operations, marketing, legal, compliance, people team, internal infrastructure, and more

Requirements

• Masters degree in Computer Science, Math, Statistics, or a related field and 10+ years experience OR a PhD in Computer Science or a related field and 5+ years experience
• 3+ years experience focused on AI/ML/NLP solutions delivery
• 5+ years of experience experience leading and implementing AI/ML projects from ideation to delivery, evaluation, and maintenance in production
• Hands-on experience implementing AI/ML and/or NLP solutions
• Proven experience in Python and AI/ML frameworks and tools (e.g., MLFlow, TensorFLow, PyTorch)
• Experience developing and deploying data pipelines, machine learning models, or applications on cloud platforms (e.g., Azure, AWS, Databricks, AzureML)
• Experience with Gen AI solution pipelines (e.g., RAG) and Large Language Modeling and Transformer Architectures (e.g., BERT, GPT, etc.)
• Proven presentation experience with the ability to explain complex AI/ML concepts and results to technical and non-technical audiences
• Proven understanding of mathematical foundations of machine learning, including statistics, linear algebra, and computer science

Preferred Qualifications

• PhD in Computer Science, Mathematics, Statistics, or a related discipline
• Experience in healthcare (AI)
• Experience working with cross-functional and distributed teams in a global and diverse environment
• Experience in establishing AI/ML best practices, standards, and ethics
• Working knowledge of Software Development tools and practices including DevOps and CI/CD tools (e.g., Git, Jenkins, Docker, Kubernetes, etc.)
• Familiarity with data versioning tools (Delta Lake, DVC, LakeFS, etc.)
• Experience with model observability tools for insights into the behavior, performance, and health of your deployed ML models (tracking, alerting, compliance monitoring, etc.)

Benefits

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).

Pay

The salary for this role will range from $134,600 to $230,800 annually based on full-time employment. We comply with all minimum wage laws as applicable.

Schedule

All employees working remotely will be required to adhere to UnitedHealth Group's Telecommuter Policy.

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.