Principal Data Scientist - Hybrid in MN or DC, Remote Elsewhere

About the position Transform Healthcare Through AI Innovation at Optum Optum is a global organization delivering care, powered by data and technology, to help millions of people live healthier lives. At Optum.ai, we are not just witnessing the AI transformation in healthcare—we are leading it. Our mission is clear: to simplify healthcare with AI, turning insight into action at a scale few organizations in the world can match. As part of the Optum.ai team, you’ll work at the intersection of cutting-edge artificial intelligence and real-world healthcare impact. From reducing administrative burden for providers to anticipating patient needs and improving access to quality care, your work will help solve some of healthcare’s most complex challenges—and directly improve health outcomes for millions of people. You’ll collaborate with world-class talent across data science, engineering, product, and healthcare domains, backed by the reach and stability of Optum and UnitedHealth Group. Here, responsible innovation matters. So do comprehensive benefits, meaningful career growth, and the opportunity to make a tangible difference—advancing health equity and creating a simpler, more connected healthcare experience for everyone. This is more than a job. It’s a chance to shape the future of healthcare through the transformative power of AI. Join us to start Caring. Connecting. Growing together. Optum AI is UnitedHealth Group’s enterprise AI team. We are AI/ML scientists and engineers with deep expertise in AI/ML engineering for healthcare. We develop AI/ML solutions for the highest impact opportunities across UnitedHealth Group businesses including UnitedHealthcare, Optum Financial, Optum Health, Optum Insight, and Optum Rx. In addition to transforming the healthcare journey through responsible AI/ML innovation, our charter also includes developing and supporting an enterprise AI/ML development platform. As a Principal Data Scientist, you will serve as a senior individual contributor responsible for designing and delivering advanced AI/ML and Generative AI systems that address complex healthcare and operational challenges. You will lead the development of large-scale machine learning solutions, architect GenAI and agent-based systems, and drive technical innovation across high-impact AI initiatives. This role requires deep hands-on expertise in machine learning, LLM systems, distributed AI architectures, and production-grade ML platforms. 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. 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.

Responsibilities

• Lead development of advanced AI/ML systems using techniques such as deep learning, representation learning, time-series modeling, survival analysis, and probabilistic modeling to solve complex healthcare problems
• Develop Generative AI and LLM-powered solutions including retrieval-augmented generation (RAG) pipelines, domain-adapted LLMs, and AI copilots for enterprise workflows
• Architect scalable AI and ML systems including feature engineering pipelines, feature stores, model training workflows, model serving infrastructure, monitoring systems, and automated retraining pipelines
• Build agentic AI and autonomous workflows using agent frameworks, agentic skills, MCP integrations, and agent-to-agent (A2A) communication patterns
• Advance model evaluation, reliability, and monitoring strategies including offline metrics, LLM benchmarking, safety testing, hallucination mitigation, and drift detection
• Drive responsible AI practices including explainability, interpretability, bias detection, fairness evaluation, and governance aligned with enterprise and regulatory standards
• Serve as a senior technical authority in AI/ML by mentoring data scientists and reviewing complex modeling approaches and architectures
• Collaborate with engineering, platform, and product teams to operationalize scalable AI/ML and GenAI systems within enterprise platforms

Requirements

• 10+ years of experience in machine learning, artificial intelligence, or applied data science with 7+ years designing and deploying production machine learning systems
• 8+ years of experience in Python-based machine learning development using frameworks such as PyTorch, TensorFlow, or equivalent along with strong SQL skills
• 5+ years of experience deploying production ML systems including model serving, monitoring, ML lifecycle management, and collaboration with engineering teams
• 3+ years of experience developing Generative AI or LLM-based applications including prompt engineering, RAG pipelines, LLM evaluation, and safety guardrails
• 1+ years of experience building or evaluating agentic AI systems including AI agents, agentic skills, Model Context Protocol (MCP), agent-to-agent (A2A) interaction patterns, or autonomous workflows

Nice-to-haves

• Experience working with distributed ML systems and large-scale data platforms such as Spark, Databricks, Ray, or Kubernetes-based ML systems
• Experience deploying AI solutions on cloud platforms such as AWS, Azure, or GCP
• Experience working with healthcare datasets and standards such as claims, EHR, ICD, CPT, SNOMED, FHIR, or HL7
• External contributions such as publications, patents, or open-source projects in machine learning or generative AI

Benefits

• a comprehensive benefits package
• incentive and recognition programs
• equity stock purchase and 401k contribution

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