Manager, AI Data Engineering (UK Remote)

Turnitin; Newcastle upon Tyne; Remote; GBP 80,000 - 100,000; Full time

Job summary

A global educational technology leader in the UK is seeking an AI Data Engineering and Data Science Manager to lead a team focused on advanced data pipelines and AI innovation. The ideal candidate will have over 5 years of experience in data engineering and data science, with proven leadership abilities. This role promotes remote work and offers a competitive benefits package while driving academic integrity through technology.

Benefits

Remote First Culture

Health Care Coverage

Education Reimbursement

Competitive Paid Time Off

Qualifications

• 5+ years of experience in data engineering and data science, ideally focused on enabling and accelerating AI R&D.
• 2+ years of experience in a managerial or technical leadership role.
• Experience with Large Language Models (LLMs) and AI-driven data systems.

Responsibilities

• Lead a team that owns all data collection and data curation for the AI team.
• Design, build, operate and deploy real-time data pipelines.
• Partner cross-functionally to curate AI datasets and drive data innovation.

Skills

Python

SQL

Data Engineering

Data Science

AI R&D

MLOps

Infrastructure as Code

Problem-solving

Analytical skills

Communication

Education

Bachelor's degree in Computer Science or related field

Tools

AWS

Azure

GCP

Terraform

CloudFormation

Airflow

Job description

Overview

Turnitin is an AI-focused leader in the educational and research sectors, promoting academic integrity and innovation for over two decades. We are renowned for our cutting-edge solutions used by thousands of academic institutions, corporations, and publishers worldwide.

Turnitin offers remote working as a standard arrangement and is a remote-first employer with an office in Newcastle (UK) and colleagues spanning the globe. We value flexibility, diversity, local cultures, and individual choices, all aimed at making a significant impact in education.

AI and data science are integral to our success and ambitious product roadmap. Joining us as an AI Data Engineer means becoming part of a global team of proactive, supportive, and independent professionals delivering sophisticated, well-structured AI and data systems. You will help pioneer our next generation data and AI pipelines, collaborating with different teams within Turnitin to integrate AI and data science across a broad suite of products that enhance learning, teaching, and academic integrity.

Responsibilities

In your role as AI Data Engineering and Data Science Manager, you’ll lead a team that owns all data collection and data curation for the AI team, with emphasis on automated data collection and labeling using state-of-the-art AI and LLMs. Key responsibilities include:

• Leadership: Build and grow a team of AI data engineers, ensuring their growth and high performance.
• Strategy: Advise senior leadership on how to leverage AI-driven data engineering to create future-ready data and AI strategies.
• Communication: Ensure clarity of the company’s vision and mission across the team and foster excellent communication within the organization.
• AI Data Engineering: Design, build, operate and deploy real-time data pipelines at scale using AI methods and best practices. Apply cutting-edge data warehousing, data science and data engineering technologies to accelerate Turnitin’s AI R&D efforts. Identify strategic unlocks such as LLM agents to enable faster time-to-market and better reusability of AI initiatives.
• Collaboration: Partner cross-functionally with teams across Turnitin, especially AI R&D, Applied AI, and Data Platform teams, to collect, create, curate and catalog high-quality AI datasets that drive our AI pipeline and answer critical business questions. Ensure alignment and integration of data architecture and data models across products and platforms.
• Hands-on Involvement: Engage in data engineering and data science tasks as required to support the team. Lead external data collection efforts, including state-of-the-art prompt engineering techniques, to support the construction of state-of-the-art AI models.
• Innovation: Drive data innovation through research and development to extract insights from Turnitin’s data resources.
• Continuous Learning: Stay updated on new tools and development strategies and bring innovation recommendations to leadership.

Qualifications

Required Qualifications;

• At least 5 years of experience in data engineering and data science, ideally focused on enabling and accelerating AI R&D.
• At least 2 years of experience in a managerial or technical leadership role, with responsibility for large cross-functional projects.
• Strong proficiency in Python, SQL, and Infrastructure as Code (Terraform, CloudFormation), with experience in modern orchestration frameworks (Airflow, Prefect, or dbt).
• Proficiency with cloud-native data platforms (AWS, Azure, GCP) and vector databases (Pinecone, Weaviate, Qdrant, or Chroma).
• Experience with MLOps tools and platforms (HuggingFace, SageMaker Bedrock, Vertex AI), experiment tracking (MLflow, Weights & Biases), and model deployment pipelines.
• Experience with Large Language Models (LLMs), embedding generation, retrieval-augmented generation (RAG) systems, and frameworks for orchestrating LLM interaction (LiteLLM, LangFuse, LangChain, LlamaIndex).
• Strong problem-solving, analytical, and communication skills, with the ability to design scalable AI data systems and collaborate effectively in cross-functional teams.

Desired Qualifications:

• 7+ years of experience in data engineering and data science, with a focus on AI and machine learning projects.
• 2+ years of experience in a managerial or technical leadership role.
• Experience in education, EdTech, or academic integrity sectors.
• Experience using AI coding tools (Cursor, Claude Code, GitHub Copilot) for accelerated development.
• Familiarity with natural language processing, computer vision, or multimodal AI applications.
• Experience with data visualization (Streamlit) and data reporting.

Characteristics for Success

As an AI Data Engineering and Data Science Manager, you should have:

• A passion for creatively solving complex data problems.
• Ability to work collaboratively and cross-functionally, with strong leadership skills.
• A strong growth mindset and ability to constantly improve your skills and knowledge.
• Excellent track record of delivering results and ensuring a high level of quality.
• A desire to mentor, guide and grow high potential individual contributors.
• Excellent written and verbal communication skills.
• A sense of curiosity about the problems at hand, the field at large, and the best solutions.
• Strong system-level problem-solving skills.

Additional Information

Total Rewards @ Turnitin
Turnitin maintains a Total Rewards package that is competitive within the local job market. This includes monetary and non-monetary rewards, generous time off and health and wellness programs that prioritize well-being and flexibility. The company emphasizes a remote-centric culture and a comprehensive package to support employees.

Our Mission is to ensure the integrity of global education and meaningfully improve learning outcomes.

Our Values underpin everything we do.

• Customer Centric - Put educators and learners at the center of everything we do to ensure integrity and improve learning outcomes.
• Passion for Learning - Encourage constant learning and growth and provide a workplace that enables it.
• Integrity - The heartbeat of Turnitin, shaping our products and interactions.
• Action & Ownership - Bias toward action and empowerment to make decisions.
• One Team - Break down silos, collaborate effectively, and celebrate successes.
• Global Mindset - Respect local cultures and embrace diversity to maximize impact.

Global Benefits

• Remote First Culture
• Health Care Coverage*
• Education Reimbursement*
• Competitive Paid Time Off
• 4 Self-Care Days per year
• National Holidays*
• 2 Founder Days + Juneteenth Observed
• Paid Volunteer Time*
• Charitable contribution match*
• Monthly Wellness or Home Office Reimbursement/*
• Access to Modern Health (mental health platform)
• Parental Leave*
• Retirement Plan with match/contribution*

* varies by country

Seeing Beyond the Job Ad

At Turnitin, we recognize it’s unrealistic for candidates to fulfill 100% of the criteria in a job ad. We encourage you to apply if you meet the majority of the requirements because we know that skills evolve over time. If you’re willing to learn and evolve alongside us, join our team!

Turnitin, LLC is committed to the policy that all persons have equal access to its programs, facilities and employment. All qualified applicants will receive consideration for employment without regard to race, color, religion, sex, sexual orientation, gender identity, national origin, disability, or status as a protected veteran.