Principal Data Scientist

The Elevance Health Companies, Inc.; Winston-Salem (NC); Hybrid; USD 140,000 - 190,000; Full time

Benefits offered by this job

merit increases

paid holidays

Paid Time Off

incentive bonus programs

medical

dental

vision

short and long term disabilityBenefits

401(k) +match

stock purchase plan

life insurance

wellness programs

financial education resources

Job summary

Elevance Health is seeking a Principal Data Scientist to guide predictive modeling initiatives at our Winston‑Salem, NC hybrid site. The role focuses on designing and executing advanced analytics with large data sets, mentoring the team, and translating insights for business partners.

Office presence 1–2 days weekly supports collaboration while enabling flexible work patterns. You will develop proprietary modeling approaches, optimize ML pipelines, and drive continuous improvement across

Qualifications

• Bachelor's degree in Statistics, Computer Science, Mathematics, ML, Econometrics, Physics, Biostatistics or related quantitative discipline.
• Seven (7) years in predictive analytics experience.
• Alternate education: Master's degree with five (5) years of predictive analytics experience.

Responsibilities

• Lead design and execution of predictive modeling projects addressing business problems in collaboration with partners.
• Guide senior and junior team members on data-science techniques and best practices.
• Stay current with data-science innovations and big data processing.
• Develop, test, and validate scalable ML models for large datasets (structured and unstructured).
• Communicate results and insights to business partners and influence decisions.

Job description

Anticipated End Date

2026-11-28

Position Title

Principal Data Scientist

Job Description

Principal Data Scientist Location: Ideal candidates will be able to report to our Pulse Point location at 5650 University Pkwy, Winston‑Salem, NC 27105. This role requires associates to be in‑office 1 - 2 days per week, fostering collaboration and connectivity, while providing flexibility to support productivity and work‑life balance. This approach combines structured office engagement with the autonomy of virtual work, promoting a dynamic and adaptable workplace. Please note that per our policy on hybrid/virtual work, candidates not within a reasonable commuting distance from the posting location(s) will not be considered for employment, unless an accommodation is granted as required by law.

Work Hours

Monday to Friday, 8:00 am to 5:00 pm

How You Will Make an Impact

• Serve as the methodology-expert on the team and provide guidelines to team for applying appropriate algorithms or solutions to approach different data challenges.
• Coach junior team members on various data science techniques..
• Keep abreast of the latest enhancements and innovations within the areas of data science and big data processing.
• Lead the design and execution of predictive modeling projects to address specific business problems determined by consultation with business partners.
• Provide guidance to the team on working with data-sets of varying degrees of size and complexity including both structured and unstructured data.
• At the expert level, piping and processing massive data-streams in distributed computing environments such as Hadoop to facilitate analysis.
• Leads batch and real‑time model scoring to drive actions.
• Leads the development of proprietary predictive modeling algorithms to build customized solutions that go beyond standard industry tools and lead to innovative solutions.
• Leads communication and publish results and address constraints/limitations with business partners.
• Determines the continuous improvement opportunities of current predictive modeling algorithms.
• Proactively collaborates with business partners to determine identified population segments and develop actionable plans to enable the identification of patterns related to quality, use, cost and other variables that have a broad impact.

Minimum Requirements

• Bachelor's degree in Statistics, Computer Science, Mathematics, Machine Learning, Econometrics, Physics, Biostatistics or related Quantitative discipline.
• Seven (7) years in any occupation with predictive analytics experience.

Experience Requirements

• End-to end predictive modeling and large-scale data preparation (ETL, feature engineering, training/validation, scoring) using Python, Apache Spark (PySpark/Spark SQL), PostgreSQL, and advanced SQL
• OS-level development, system control, dependency management, reproducible environments, and ML pipeline runtime setup using advanced Linux and Python environment tools (e.g., Anaconda/conda, pip/venv, airflow)
• Distributed ETL and processing for massive structured and unstructured datasets using Hadoop and Hive
• Enterprise cloud data access, storage, and compute for analytics and model execution using AWS
• Supervised ML development, tuning, and evaluation using scikit-learn and XGBoost
• Regression/GLMs, hypothesis testing, confidence interval interpretation, ANOVA, residual diagnostics, and evaluation methods (e.g., propensity score matching) using advanced statistical modeling and inference
• Customized deep learning model development using tools beyond standard tools (e.g., PyTorch)
• Parallelization and performance optimization for compute-intensive workloads using multicore/OpenMP concepts
• Code versioning, branching, collaboration, and release management using Git
• Developing, testing, and validating complex SQL for analytics pipelines using professional SQL IDEs/DB clients (e.g., JetBrains DataGrip)
• and Experience with analyses leveraging electronic medical records, claims, and health coverage eligibility data.

Alternate Education / Experience Requirements

• Employer will accept a Master's degree in Statistics, Computer Science, Mathematics, Machine Learning, Econometrics, Physics, Biostatistics or related Quantitative discipline and Five (5) years in any occupation with predictive analytics experience.
• Must have skills listed above.

Job Level

Non-Management Exempt

Workshift

Job Family: IFT > Data Science

Who We Are

Elevance Health is a health company dedicated to improving lives and communities – and making healthcare simpler. We are a Fortune 25 company with a longstanding history in the healthcare industry, looking for leaders at all levels of the organization who are passionate about making an impact on our members and the communities we serve.

How We Work

At Elevance Health, we are creating a culture that is designed to advance our strategy but will also lead to personal and professional growth for our associates.

Our values and behaviors are the root of our culture. They are how we achieve our strategy, power our business outcomes and drive our shared success - for our consumers, our associates, our communities and our business.

Benefits

• merit increases
• paid holidays
• Paid Time Off
• incentive bonus programs (unless covered by a collective bargaining agreement)
• medical
• dental
• vision
• short and long term disability benefits
• 401(k) +match
• stock purchase plan
• life insurance
• wellness programs
• financial education resources

Elevance Health operates in a Hybrid Workforce Strategy. Unless specified as primarily virtual by the hiring manager, associates are required to work at an Elevance Health location at least once per week, and potentially several times per week. Specific requirements and expectations for time onsite will be discussed as part of the hiring process.

The health of our associates and communities is a top priority for Elevance Health. We require all new candidates in certain patient/member-facing roles to become vaccinated against COVID-19 and Influenza. If you are not vaccinated, your offer will be rescinded unless you provide an acceptable explanation.

Elevance Health will also follow all relevant federal, state, and local laws.

Elevance Health is an Equal Employment Opportunity employer, and all qualified applicants will receive consideration for employment without regard to age, citizenship status, color, creed, disability, ethnicity, genetic information, gender (including gender identity and gender expression), marital status, national origin, race, religion, sex, sexual orientation, veteran status or any other status or condition protected by applicable federal, state, or local laws.

Applicants who require accommodation to participate in the job application process should submit the following form: Accessibility Accommodation Request Form and a member of the team will be in contact.

Qualified applicants with arrest or conviction records will be considered for employment in accordance with all federal, state, and local laws, including, but not limited to, the Los Angeles County Fair Chance Ordinance and the California Fair Chance Act.

Prospective employees required to be screened under Florida law should review the education and awareness resources at HB531 | Florida Agency for Health Care Administration.

NOTE: Workday keeps job postings active through 11:59:59 PM on the day before the listed end date. Example: If the end date is 3/13, the posting will automatically come down on 3/12 at 11:59:59 PM. In other words — the job is posted until 3/13, not through 3/13.

Elevance Health is an Equal Employment Opportunity employer, and all qualified applicants will receive consideration for employment without regard to age, citizenship status, color, creed, disability, ethnicity, genetic information, gender (including gender identity and gender expression), marital status, national origin, race, religion, sex, sexual orientation, veteran status or any other status or condition protected by applicable federal, state, or local laws.

Applicants who require accommodation to participate in the job application process should submit the following form: Accessibility Accommodation Request Form and a member of the team will be in contact.

Qualified applicants with arrest or conviction records will be considered for employment in accordance with all federal, state, and local laws, including, but not limited to, the Los Angeles County Fair Chance Ordinance and the California Fair Chance Act.

Prospective employees required to be screened under Florida law should review the education and awareness resources at HB531 | Florida Agency for Health Care Administration Please visit the Contract Worker Community Page. Elevance Health is an Equal Opportunity Employer/Disability/Veterans.