Sr. Director of Machine Learning

Ladders; United States; Remote; USD 175,000 - 210,000; Full time

Benefits offered by this job

Collaborative work environment

Leadership in AI strategy

Access to cutting-edge AI tech

Professional development

Meaningful impact on healthcare

Job summary

Ladders is seeking a Sr. Director of Machine Learning to shape strategy and execution for AI services in healthcare, delivering clinically relevant outcomes in a regulated environment.

You will lead teams building reliable, scalable systems on frontier LLMs while balancing model quality, latency, and cost. Collaborate with Clinical Affairs and ML infrastructure to deliver production ML solutions from design to deployment.

Qualifications

• 14+ years of experience in machine learning and software engineering.
• 8+ years leading ML teams, including managing tech leads.
• Proven track record shipping scalable ML products.
• Deep knowledge of LLM development and applications.
• Experience training and deploying deep learning models.
• Strong judgment in software architecture.
• Ability to balance model quality with latency and cost.
• Excellent communication skills across teams.
• Experience in healthcare or regulated domains is a plus.

Responsibilities

• Lead and grow a team of ML professionals building AI services end to end.
• Own the strategy for frontier LLMs with reliability focus.
• Design orchestration and validation systems around LLM usage.
• Direct development of custom ML models for clinical recommendations.
• Set productionizing standards, including SLOs.
• Decide on build, fine-tune, and prompt strategies.
• Collaborate with Clinical Affairs on model oversight.
• Define evaluation criteria with ML infra and evaluation teams.
• Translate business problems into actionable ML tasks with stakeholders.
• Establish and maintain engineering and scientific standards.
• Develop hiring and mentorship practices.
• Serve as a technical voice in AI strategy and multi-year initiatives.

Skills

Machine Learning

Team Leadership

LLM Development

Production ML Systems

Software Architecture

Cost & Latency Tradeoffs

Cross-functional Influence

Communication

Healthcare Domain

Tools

LLM Platforms

ML Infrastructure

Job description

For our client, we are seeking a Sr. Director of Machine Learning to join the team of a leader in the Healthcare space.

This leader will shape the strategy and execution for AI and machine learning services that support clinically relevant outcomes in a regulated healthcare environment. The role will guide teams building reliable, scalable systems on top of frontier LLMs while balancing model quality, latency, and cost. You will partner closely with Clinical Affairs, ML infrastructure, evaluation specialists, and other cross-functional stakeholders to turn ambiguous business needs into production-ready ML solutions.

Location: Remote - US based candidates only, no visa sponsorship available

Compensation: $175,000 – $210,000 annually

Responsibilities

• Lead and grow a team of machine learning professionals building AI services end to end
• Own the strategy for building on top of frontier LLMs with a strong focus on reliability
• Drive the design of orchestration and validation systems around LLM usage
• Direct the development of custom ML models for clinical recommendations
• Set standards for productionizing AI services, including SLOs
• Make deliberate decisions on build, fine-tune, and prompt strategies
• Collaborate with Clinical Affairs on clinically facing model oversight
• Define evaluation criteria in partnership with ML infrastructure and evaluation teams
• Translate ambiguous business problems into actionable ML tasks with cross-functional stakeholders
• Establish and maintain engineering and scientific standards within the team
• Develop hiring and mentorship practices for team members
• Serve as a technical voice in AI strategy and multi-year initiatives

Qualifications

• 14+ years of experience in machine learning and software engineering
• 8+ years leading ML teams, including management of tech leads
• Proven track record of shipping scalable ML products
• Deep knowledge of LLM development and applications
• Experience training and deploying deep learning models
• Strong judgment in software architecture
• Ability to balance model quality with latency and cost
• Excellent communication skills with the ability to influence across teams
• Experience in healthcare or other regulated domains is a plus
• Experience with clinical decision support systems is a plus

Benefits

• Collaborative work environment with a focus on innovation
• Opportunity to lead and shape impactful AI strategies
• Access to cutting-edge technology and resources in AI
• Engagement in meaningful work that affects healthcare outcomes
• Support for continuous learning and professional development

Our client is an equal opportunity employer.