Head of Core Technology

Job summary

The AI Security Institute (AISI) is the largest team in a government dedicated to understanding AI capabilities and risks in the world.

Our mission is to equip governments with an empirical understanding of the safety of advanced AI systems. We conduct research to understand the capabilities and impacts of advanced AI, and develop and test risk mitigations. We focus on risks with security implications, including the potential of AI to assist with the development of chemical and biological weapons, how it can be used to carry out cyber-attacks, enable crimes such as fraud, and the possibility of loss of control.

The risks from AI are urgent. By combining the agility of a tech start-up with the expertise and mission-driven focus of government, we’re building a unique and innovative organisation to prevent AI’s harms from impeding its potential.

Job description

You will lead our Core Tech team – around 15 software engineers, organised into sub teams.

Through a blend of ML tooling and infrastructure, data and pipeline management, web development, and data visualisation, the Core Tech Team enables AISI’s core work of evaluating cutting edge advanced AI Systems. It does this by:

• Supporting the research workstreams and understand and anticipate their infrastructure and research tooling needs

• Creating and maintaining world-class tools like Inspect AI (for assessing AI model capabilities)

• Developing and streamlining capabilities to host and fine-tune our own models

• Ensuring that our platform and team practices adhere to internal DSIT security standards and appropriately manage risks.

Your team will be cross-functional, collaborating closely with scientists, domain experts, and research engineers to develop brand new evaluation tools that leverage emerging research, while maintaining the highest levels of privacy and security integrity due to the sensitive nature of our work.

We work with a mixture of our own custom and open-source libraries for evaluations, analysis and visualisation. While much of our work will require prototyping and proving completely new approaches, our expectation is that you, as Head of Core Tech, will ultimately own the delivery of a rock-solid set of core products that the rest of AISI can depend on.

As the most senior engineers in the organisation, Core Tech also provides engineering leadership and support to SWEs and Research Engineers who are embedded in other teams. There are also occasional requests to support wider DSIT digital teams – this is not a core part of the role, but reflects that you are a senior Engineering leader not just in AISI but across the department.

Person specification

You will need substantial experience managing high performing and diverse software engineering teams, and to have the following qualities:

• A track record of shipping software or ML-based products, ideally in a research context.

• Excellence in managing fast-moving teams, showing the ability to work iteratively and responding to ambiguous and changing requirements.

• Can own problems end-to-end, and are willing to pick up whatever knowledge you're missing to get the job done and push through obstacles.

• Able to negotiate the right level of flexibility in developing research prototypes, trading off against delivering a solid engineering platform.

• Prowess in finding creative solutions that accelerate engineers’ work and achieve higher velocity without increasing pressure on your team.

• Are strategic in balancing technical debt with pace of development and upholding reliability and good test coverage.

• Enjoy supporting your colleagues, and mentoring your team.

Technical skills

We'll assess you against these technical skills during the selection process:

• The specific interview presentation title will be: ‘Please spend 30/45 mins presenting on your strategic vision for the workstream.

Benefits

Alongside your salary of £135,000, Department for Science, Innovation & Technology contributes £39,109 towards you being a member of the Civil Service Defined Benefit Pension scheme. Find out what benefits a Civil Service Pension provides.

The Department for Science, Innovation and Technology offers a competitive mix of benefits including:

• A culture of flexible working, such as job sharing, homeworking and compressed hours.
• Automatic enrolment into the Civil Service Pension Scheme, with an employer contribution of 28.97%.
• A minimum of 25 days of paid annual leave, increasing by 1 day per year up to a maximum of 30.
• An extensive range of learning & professional development opportunities, which all staff are actively encouraged to pursue.
• Access to a range of retail, travel and lifestyle employee discounts.

Office attendance

The Department operates a discretionary hybrid working policy, which provides for a combination of working hours from your place of work and from your home in the UK. The current expectation for staff is to attend the office or non-home based location for 40-60% of the time over the accounting period.

Things you need to know

Artificial intelligence

Artificial intelligence can be a useful tool to support your application, however, all examples and statements provided must be truthful, factually accurate and taken directly from your own experience. Where plagiarism has been identified (presenting the ideas and experiences of others, or generated by artificial intelligence, as your own) applications may be withdrawn and internal candidates may be subject to disciplinary action. Please see our candidate guidance (opens in a new window) for more information on appropriate and inappropriate use.

Selection process details

This vacancy is using Success Profiles (opens in a new window), and will assess your Experience and Technical skills.

As part of the application process you will be asked to complete a CV. Further details around what this will entail are listed on the application form.

Candidates will apply with their CV outlining relevant experience required for the job. The AISI Talent Team will then sift all applications based on essential criteria outlined in the personal specification.

Those successful at sift will be invited to attend an interview which will comprehensively assess experience related to the role.

Sift and interview dates to be confirmed.

You will be asked to present on your vision and expected outcomes for the workstream, followed by Q&A from the panel.

The specific interview presentation title will be: ‘Please spend 30/45 mins presenting on your strategic vision for the workstream.’

This role sits outside of the DDaT pay framework given the scope of this role requires in depth technical expertise in frontier AI safety, robustness and advanced AI architectures.

Further Information

Existing Civil Servants and applicants from accredited NDPBs are eligible to apply,and can be considered on loan basis (Civil Servants) or secondment (accredited NDPBs). Prior agreement to be released on a loan basis must be obtained before commencing the application process. In the case of Civil Servants, the terms of the loan will be agreed between the home and host department and the Civil Servant. This includes grade on return.

Reasonable Adjustment

We are proud to be a disability confident leader and we welcome applications from disabled candidates and candidates with long-term conditions.

Information about the Disability Confident Scheme (DCS) and some examples of adjustments that we offer to disabled candidates and candidates with long-term health conditions during our recruitment process can be found in our DSIT Candidate Guidance. A DSIT Plain Text Version of the guidance is also available.

We encourage candidates to discuss their adjustment needs by emailing the job contact which can be found under the contact point for applicants section.

If you are experiencing accessibility problems with any attachments on this advert, please contact the email address in the 'Contact point for applicants' section.

If successful and transferring from another Government Department a criminal record check may be carried out.

New entrants are expected to join on the minimum of the pay band.

A location based reserve list of successful candidates will be kept for 12 months. Should another role become available within that period you may be offered this position.

Candidates who meet the minimum benchmark may be placed on a Reserve List for consideration for similar roles, including those at a lower grade. Candidates who narrowly miss the benchmark and are not placed on the Reserve List may still be considered for an offer in a similar role at a lower grade.

Please note terms and conditions are attached. Please take time to read the document to determine how these may affect you.

Any move to the Department for Science, Innovation and Technology from another employer will mean you can no longer access childcare vouchers. This includes moves between government departments. You may however be eligible for other government schemes, including Tax Free Childcare; for further information visit the Childcare Choices website.

DSIT does not normally offer full home working (i.e. working at home); but we do offer a variety of flexible working options (including occasionally working from home).

DSIT cannot offer Visa sponsorship to candidates through this campaign. DSIT holds a Visa sponsorship licence but this can only be used for certain roles and this campaign does not qualify.

In order to process applications without delay, we will be sending a Criminal Record Check to Disclosure and Barring Service on your behalf.

However, we recognise in exceptional circumstances some candidates will want to send their completed forms direct. If you will be doing this, please advise Government Recruitment Service of your intention by emailing Pre-EmploymentChecks.grs@cabinetoffice.gov.uk stating the job reference number in the subject heading.

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.

Feedback

Feedback will only be provided if you attend an interview or assessment.

Security

Successful candidates must undergo a criminal record check.People working with government assets must complete baseline personnel security standard (opens in new window) checks.

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

Further information on nationality requirements (opens in a new window)

Working for the Civil Service

The Civil Service Code (opens in a new window) sets out the standards of behaviour expected of civil servants.

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).The Civil Service embraces diversity and promotes equal opportunities. As such, we run a Disability Confident Scheme (DCS) for candidates with disabilities who meet the minimum selection criteria.The Civil Service also offers a Redeployment Interview Scheme to civil servants who are at risk of redundancy, and who meet the minimum requirements for the advertised vacancy.

Diversity and Inclusion

The Civil Service is committed to attract, retain and invest in talent wherever it is found. To learn more please see theCivil Service People Plan (opens in a new window) and the Civil Service Diversity and Inclusion Strategy (opens in a new window).

Apply and further information

This vacancy is part of the Great Place to Work for Veterans (opens in a new window) initiative.The Civil Service welcomes applications from people who have recently left prison or have an unspent conviction. Read more about prison leaver recruitment (opens in new window).Once this job has closed, the job advert will no longer be available. You may want to save a copy for your records.

Contact point for applicants

Job contact :

• Name : Ben Sams
• Email : ben.sams@dsit.gov.uk

Recruitment team

• Email : dsitresourcing.grs@cabinetoffice.gov.uk

Further information

Appointment to the Civil Service is governed by the Civil Service Commission’s Recruitment Principles. If you feel that your application has not been treated in accordance with the recruitment principles, and wish to make a complaint, then you should contact in the first instance DSITrecruitment.grs@cabinetoffice.gov.uk . If you are not satisfied with the response that you receive, then you can contact the Civil Service Commission. For further information on bringing a complaint to the Civil Service Commission please visit their web pages: Click here to visit Civil Service Commission/Complaints.

Attachments

DSIT T&Cs v1.2 Opens in new window (docx, 179kB)