Principal AI Engineer
Summary
Principal AI Engineer at the UK Department for Transport leading end-to-end technical delivery of AI products - designing, building, deploying and maintaining classical ML and LLM/agentic systems that inform policy and improve transport. Core stack: Python, GCP, CI/CD, Terraform, MLOps.
- Job grade: Grade 7
- Contract type: Permanent
- Business area: DFT - Decarbonisation, Technology & Strategy Group (DTS)
- Type of role: Analytical, Architecture and Data, Digital, Engineering, Science
- Working pattern: Flexible working, Full-time, Job share, Part-time
- Number of jobs available: 7
Location
About the job
Job summary
Do you want to develop impactful AI products that address real-world transport challenges?
Are you an innovator who is driven to implement AI within DfT to support our business and responsibly deploy it across the transport system to improve transport user experiences and boost growth?
Then we’d love for you to apply for this job!
We’re looking for Principal AI Engineers to lead the technical delivery of innovative, well-designed solutions that inform high-stakes decisions, transform complex processes and operations, and support critical policy objectives.
You will use your technical expertise to design, build, deploy, and maintain AI solutions – providing technical ownership through all phases of the product lifecycle. This involves effectively collaborating with colleagues within DfT, across government and with external partners.
Our Team
You will join the AI and Data Science Team, which owns the technical development of AI products and solutions in DfT’s AI Programme. Our AI Programme is split across five G6-led partner team(s): AI and Data Science own the technical development of AI and data science products (i.e., where this role sits); Human Centred AI design and implement social, behavioural and user research; Strategy, Governance and Responsible Adoption; and Transport sector AI Policy. We are also supported by the Problem Structuring and Analysis team. Our teams work together very closely.
As demand for our work has grown, we are now looking for new members to join us!
Joining our department comes with many benefits, including:
- Employer pension contribution of 28.97% of your salary. Read more about Civil Service Pensions here.
- 25 days annual leave, increasing by 1 day each year of service (up to a maximum of 30 days annual leave), plus 8 bank holidays a privilege day for the King’s birthday.
- Flexible working options where we encourage a great work-life balance.
Read more in the Benefits section below!
Find out more about what it's like working at Department for Transport Central - Department for Transport Careers and within the Government Digital and Data Profession.
Job description
Your responsibilities will include, but aren’t limited to:
- Lead the design, development, and deployment of impactful AI solutions - including classical ML and agentic/LLM-based systems - providing technical leadership and ensuring solutions meet user and organisational needs.
- Own projects end to end with minimal supervision, working with partners, internal teams, and external stakeholders to address challenges and ensure your technical work achieves its intended impact.
- Write and review high-quality, maintainable code using established software development practices and tools, including version control and testing. Proficiency in Python or a willingness to learn is expected.
- Deploy and manage products across development, test, and production environments on cloud platforms (DfT uses GCP), using CI/CD pipelines with automated testing and Terraform (IaC).
- Build responsibly by applying statistical rigour to design and implement evaluation frameworks, datasets, and metrics that reliably measure the performance, capabilities, and limitations of AI models and agents.
- Present, communicate and disseminate products and findings.
- Stay abreast of developments in research and industry, finding innovative ways to apply them to improve our products and ways of working across the team and department.
- Developing version-controlled architecture diagrams, considering trade-offs across areas such as Identity and Access Management (IAM), model deployment and serving, optimisation, data processing and pipelines, observability/monitoring, scalability, reliability, and security.
You may (depending on expertise, interest and need) be responsible for:
- Using your credibility in AI architecture to represent and justify architecture designs at governance meetings.
- Owning MLOps and ongoing maintenance across multiple AI products in production, ensuring effective monitoring, incident response, updates and service management.
For further information on the role, please read the role profile. Please note that the role profile is for information purposes only - whilst all elements are relevant to the role, they may not all be assessed during the recruitment process. This job advert will detail exactly what will be assessed during the recruitment process.
Person specification
You will need to have experience of:
- Leading the end-to-end technical delivery of impactful AI or data science products, including design, development, deployment, monitoring, assurance, incident response and continuous improvement in production environments (lead criterion).
- Programming and software engineering to design and develop high-quality, scalable and maintainable solutions, applying strong engineering practices including version control, testing and code review.
- Deploying and managing products across development, test, and production environments on cloud platforms (e.g., GCP/AWS), using CI/CD pipelines with automated testing and Terraform or similar infrastructure-as-code (IaC) tools to ship changes safely, reproducibly, and with rollback.
- Applying a range of AI technologies, such as LLMs, VLMs, RAG, Agents, MCP, computer vision, GraphML, recommendation systems or reinforcement learning.
- Collaborating across multidisciplinary teams, translating organisational priorities into technical solutions, communicating complex information effectively, and helping build organisational capability through setting standards, coaching and establishing reusable engineering practices.
- Statistical evaluations of AI and data science solutions using appropriate designs and datasets, applying lessons from research and practice.
- Considering ethics and legislation when developing AI and data science solutions e.g., GDPR, design of appropriate human oversight in AI tools.
It is highly desirable that you have hands-on experience in one or more of the following:
- Using your credibility and expertise in AI architecture to advise and challenge colleagues on architecture design choices, ensuring proposals align with the organisation's technology landscape and strategy, establishing reusable patterns and working closely with the DfT Architecture team to support proposals through technical governance processes.
- Maintaining multiple AI products in production using MLOps practices, including monitoring, versioning, automated evaluation and CI/CD.
- Building and deploying agentic services using enterprise platforms such as Copilot and Gemini Enterprise, integrating backend services, APIs and organisational data to deliver secure, scalable solutions at pace.
- Red teaming AI products using off-the-shelf tools and custom-built tests to systematically uncover vulnerabilities and failure modes such as prompt injection, jailbreaks, data leakage, harmful outputs, and misaligned behaviour, and implementing effective mitigations.
- Building intuitive, front-end interfaces that users love.
- Training, fine-tuning and deploying models for specialist tasks.
We encourage you to apply even if you do not believe you meet all the criteria – we don’t expect you to be an expert in all areas. We understand that the AI sector continues to evolve rapidly and you may need to address some skills gaps once in the role. We’ll help you do that! Research shows that people who identify as being from underrepresented groups are more prone to experiencing imposter syndrome and doubting the strength of their candidacy, so we urge you not to exclude yourself prematurely and to submit an application.
Additional Information
The role is part of the Government Digital and Data (or Government Security Profession Career Framework) profession and utilises an enhanced Capability–Based Pay Framework which provides access to a Digital and Data allowance.
The base pay is £59,816. In addition to this the role includes a Digital and Data allowance of up to £25,095.
The value of allowance awarded will be based on an assessment of your technical skills and experience as demonstrated through the selection process. Here are more details on the pay framework.
Working hours, office attendance and travel requirements
Full time roles consist of 37 hours per week.
Whilst we welcome applications from those looking to work with us on a part time basis, there is a business requirement for the successful candidate to be able to work at least 22 hours per week.
Occasional travel to other offices will be required, which may involve overnight stays.
This role is suitable for hybrid working, which is a non-contractual arrangement where a combination of workplace and home-based working can be accommodated subject to business requirements.
The expectation at present is a minimum of 60% of your working time a month will be spent at either your designated workplace (one of the locations cited in the advert) or, when required for business reasons, in another office/work location/visiting stakeholders. Your designated workplace will be your contractual place of work. There may be occasions where you are required to attend above the minimum expectation.
If you have a question about hybrid working, part time/job share hours, flexible working, travelling for work, or require a reasonable adjustment, please contact the Vacancy Holder during the recruitment process to avoid possible disappointment later in the process should your working arrangements not be compatible with the requirements of the role (see below for contact details).
Visa Sponsorship
This role is eligible for Skilled Worker visas in accordance with the current immigration rules and salary requirements. You can read more about Skilled Worker visas and the eligibility criteria here.
Behaviours
We'll assess you against these behaviours during the selection process:
- Working Together
Technical skills
We'll assess you against these technical skills during the selection process:
- Principal Data Scientist: Applied maths, statistics and scientific practices
- Principal Data Scientist: Data engineering
- Principal Data Scientist: Delivering business impact
- Principal Data Scientist: Programming and build
- Principal Data Scientist: Understanding product delivery
Benefits
Being part of our brilliant Civil Service means you will have access to a wide range of fantastic benefits:
- Employer pension contribution of 28.97% of your salary. Read more about Civil Service Pensions here
- 25 days annual leave, increasing by 1 day each year of service (up to a maximum of 30 days annual leave).
- 8 Bank Holidays plus an additional Privilege Day to mark the King’s birthday.
- Access to the staff discount portal.
- Excellent career development opportunities and the potential to undertake professional qualifications relevant to your role paid for by the department, such as CIPD, Prince2, apprenticeships, etc.
- Joining a diverse and inclusive workforce with a range of staff communities to support all our colleagues.
- 24-hour Employee Assistance Programme providing free confidential help and advice for staff.
- Flexible working options where we encourage a great work-life balance.
Find out more about the benefits of working at DfT and its agencies.
Things you need to know
Artificial intelligence
Selection process details
How to apply:
Our selection process ensures a comprehensive assessment of each applicant's qualifications, experience, skills, and potential fit within our organisation.
The selection process for this role will be:
Stage 1: Sift of CV and personal statement
Stage 2: Technical Assessment
Stage 3: Interview
You must be successful at each stage to progress to the next stage.
Further details around what this will entail are listed on the application form.
Stage 1: Sift
At sift, you will be assessed against the following Success Profile elements:
Experience – you will be asked to provide a CV (unlimited wordcount) and personal statement (1000 word count). Please provide evidence of your Experience of the following:
- Leading the end-to-end technical delivery of impactful AI or data science products, including design, development, deployment, monitoring, assurance, incident response and continuous improvement in production environments.
- Programming and software engineering to design and develop high-quality, scalable and maintainable solutions, applying strong engineering practices including version control, testing and code review.
- Deploying and managing products across development, test, and production environments on cloud platforms (e.g., GCP/AWS), using CI/CD pipelines with automated testing and Terraform or similar infrastructure-as-code (IaC) tools to ship changes safely, reproducibly, and with rollback.
- Collaborating across multidisciplinary teams, translating organisational priorities into technical solutions, communicating complex information effectively, and helping build organisational capability through setting standards, coaching and establishing reusable engineering practices.
Should a large number of applications be received, an initial sift may be conducted using the lead experience criteria "Leading the end-to-end technical delivery of impactful AI or data science products, including design, development, deployment, monitoring, assurance, incident response and continuous improvement in production environments".
Candidates who pass the initial sift may be progressed to a full sift or progressed straight to assessment/interview.
The sift will take place from the 16th November 2026.
Stage 2: Technical Assessment
At assessment stage, you will be invited to complete a technical assessment. The assessment will take place online via Microsoft Teams. You will be assessed against the following Success Profile elements:
- Technical - Principal Data scientist - Government Digital and Data Profession Capability Framework
The assessment stage will take place from the 23rd November 2026.
Guidance will be provided if you are invited to the assessment.
Candidates successful at assessment stage will be invited to interview.
Stage 3: Interview
At interview stage, you will be assessed against the following Success Profile elements:
- Behaviours – Working Together
Your technical skill proficiency will be assessed against the Government Digital and Data Profession Capability Framework– ‘Principal Data Scientist’ framework. This is the DfT’s existing mechanism to remunerate the team with a capability-based pay allowance beyond the base pay advertised. We will assess you against the following five lead skills at interview:
- Applied maths, statistics and scientific practices
- Data engineering
- Delivering business impact
- Programming and build
- Understanding product delivery
You will also be required to create and deliver a short presentation. Guidance will be provided if you are invited to interview.
The interviews will take place from the 14th December 2026.
This interview will be conducted online via Microsoft Teams. Further details will be provided to you should you be selected for interview.
You can find out more about our hiring process, how to apply, and application and interview guidance on our careers site.
Please note that we will try to meet the dates set out in the advert. There may be occasions when these dates will change.
Further information
Reasonable Adjustments
As a Disability Confident Leader employer, we are committed to ensuring that the recruitment process is fair, accessible and allows all candidates to perform at their best. If a person with a visible or non-visible disability is substantially disadvantaged, we have a duty to make reasonable changes to our processes.
Complete the “Assistance required” section in the “Additional requirements” page of your application form to tell us what changes or help you might need during the recruitment process. For instance, you may need wheelchair access at an interview, or if you’re deaf, a Language Service Professional.
If you need a reasonable adjustment so that you can complete your application, you should contact Government Recruitment Service via dftrecruitment.grs@cabinetoffice.gov.uk as soon as possible before the closing date to discuss your needs.
Document Accessibility
This job advert contains links to the DfT Careers website. Our website provides useful guidance and information that can support you during the application process. If you are experiencing accessibility problems with any attachments on this advert or the information on our website, please contact the email address in the 'Contact point for applicants' section.
For more information about how we hire, and for useful tips on submitting your application for this role, visit the How We Hire page of our DfT Careers website. You can find detailed information about the recruitment process and what to expect when applying for a role.
Pre-employment Checking
If your application is successful but you have been dismissed from the Civil Service, your application could be removed at the pre-employment checking stage depending on the nature of the dismissal.
Applicants who are successful at interview will be, as part of pre-employment screening, subject to a check on the Internal Fraud Database (IFD). This check will provide information about employees who have been dismissed for fraud or dishonesty offences. This check also applies to employees who resign or otherwise leave before being dismissed for fraud or dishonesty had their employment continued. Any applicant’s details held on the IFD will be refused employment. A candidate is not eligible to apply for a role within the Civil Service if the application is made within a 5-year period following a dismissal for carrying out internal fraud against government.
All external applicants and current employees of accredited non-departmental public bodies (NDPBs) will be required to undergo a Social Media Check. A Social Media Check is a review of your publicly available online activity, typically across platforms like LinkedIn, Facebook, X (formerly Twitter), Instagram, and others. The purpose is to identify any public posts or content that could raise concerns for employers, such as:
- Hate speech or discriminatory behaviour
- Threats or acts of violence
- Illegal activity or substance misuse
- Sexually explicit material
- Extremist views or affiliations
Importantly, this check does not involve hacking into your accounts or accessing private messages. It only considers content you have chosen to make public. Employers use this kind of screening to help ensure their workplace remains safe, inclusive, and aligned with company values. It’s not about judging your personality or lifestyle - it’s about checking for potential red flags that might affect the role or company culture. If you have questions or concerns about the social media check, we would be happy to explain in more detail what’s being looked at and how your data is handled securely and fairly.
For further information on National Security Vetting please visit the Demystifying Vetting website.
Feedback
Feedback will only be provided if you attend an interview or assessment.
Security
Nationality requirements
This job is broadly open to the following groups:
- UK nationals
- nationals of the Republic of Ireland
- nationals of Commonwealth countries who have the right to work in the UK
- nationals of the EU, Switzerland, Norway, Iceland or Liechtenstein and family members of those nationalities with settled or pre-settled status under the European Union Settlement Scheme (EUSS) (opens in a new window)
- nationals of the EU, Switzerland, Norway, Iceland or Liechtenstein and family members of those nationalities who have made a valid application for settled or pre-settled status under the European Union Settlement Scheme (EUSS)
- individuals with limited leave to remain or indefinite leave to remain who were eligible to apply for EUSS on or before 31 December 2020
- Turkish nationals, and certain family members of Turkish nationals, who have accrued the right to work in the Civil Service
Working for the Civil Service
We recruit by merit on the basis of fair and open competition, as outlined in the Civil Service Commission's recruitment principles (opens in a new window).
Diversity and Inclusion
Apply and further information
Contact point for applicants
Job contact :
- Name : Elliot Morgan
- Email : Elliot.Morgan@dft.gov.uk
Recruitment team
- Email : dftrecruitment.grs@cabinetoffice.gov.uk
Further information
If you are not satisfied with the response you receive from the Department, you can contact the Civil Service Commission: Visit the Civil Service Commission website Here
Attachments
| Role Profile Opens in new window (pdf, 315kB) |
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Skills
- Accessibility
- Agentic AI
- AI
- API
- AWS
- CI/CD
- Cloud
- Computer Vision
- Data Engineering
- Data Science
- Fine Tuning
- GCP
- Gdpr
- IAM
- Infrastructure as Code
- LLM
- Machine Learning
- MCP
- MLOps
- Model Deployment
- Observability
- Python
- RAG
- Recommendation Systems
- Reinforcement Learning
- Statistics
- Terraform
- Test Automation
- User Research
- Version Control