Machine Learning Director - HIH - Evernorth
Top focus
INTRODUCTION TO EVERNORTH: Evernorth Health Services India, established in Hyderabad in 2024, is an innovation hub for Evernorth Health Services, the pharmacy, care and benefits division of The Cigna Group. The innovation hub will support innovation-focused areas, such as generative AI, product development, process improvement, analytics, and software engineering across The Cigna Group and its businesses.
Evernorth Health Services India builds on The Cigna Group’s existing presence in India. About Evernorth Health Services: Evernorth Health Services (Evernorth) is the pharmacy, care and benefits solution division of The Cigna Group - a Fortune 16 global health company with 75,000 employees, 186 million customers in more than 30 countries and jurisdictions around the world.
Evernorth exists to make the prediction, prevention, and treatment of illness and disease more accessible to millions of people. We do this by creating and connecting premier health services offerings, such as benefits management, pharmacy, care solutions, insights and intelligence.
About Cigna: The Cigna Group is a global health company committed to improving the health and vitality of individuals and communities around the world and includes products and services marketed under its Cigna Healthcare and Evernorth Health Services subsidiaries.
Cigna Healthcare is the health benefits provider of The Cigna Group, serving customers and clients through its U.S. Employer, U.S. Government, and International Health business. Evernorth Health Services is the pharmacy, care and benefits solution division of The Cigna Group.
Position Overview: The Director/Associate Director – AI Innovation is a leadership role at the Evernorth Hyderabad Office and sits under the Digital and Analytics Portfolio for The Cigna Group. This role is responsible for partnering closely with US AI leadership and the AI Innovation Office to deliver AI solutions (ranging from POC to GTM) that drive measurable business outcomes.
This role is suited for a deeply hands‑on AI leader who has grown through building real AI systems and can operate comfortably at a leadership level. The role works very closely with US‑based AI, digital, and product leaders, acting as a trusted delivery partner to translate AI innovation into scalable, operational solutions
Key Responsibilities
- Partner closely with US AI Innovation office, digital, and business leaders to industrialize AI ideas, accelerators, and reference architectures.
- Lead delivery of advanced AI solutions, primarily Generative AI, Agentic AI, and intelligent automation use cases.
- Design and implement agentic AI systems, including tool‑using agents, multi‑step workflows, and autonomous decision loops.
- Ensure AI solutions are production‑ready, meeting expectations on reliability, performance, security, and cost efficiency.
- Establish strong delivery discipline across AI initiatives, including testing, monitoring, and lifecycle management.
- Partner with engineering, platform, data, and security teams to integrate AI solutions into core digital and data platforms.
- Serve as a coordination and escalation partner for AI delivery risks, dependencies, and operational issues.
- Lead, build, and develop AI delivery teams in Hyderabad to execute against stakeholder priorities.
- Provide clear direction, coaching, and performance management for AI engineers and applied AI talent.
- Foster a culture of ownership, experimentation, execution rigor, and strong cross‑border collaboration between Hyderabad and US teams.
- Education: Bachelor’s or Master’s degree in Computer Science, Engineering, Artificial Intelligence, Machine Learning, or a related field from a top‑tier institution.
- Experience: 14-18 years of experience across AI, machine learning, and software engineering, with significant responsibility delivering production‑grade AI systems at scale.
- Demonstrated experience delivering Generative AI and agentic AI systems in real‑world environments.
- Experience of working in a global, matrixed setup.
- Strong people leadership experience building and scaling high‑performing technical teams
Skills
- Strong proficiency in Python for AI/ML, GenAI application development, and orchestration logic; solid working knowledge of SQL for data access and evaluation.
- Deep understanding of LLMs, foundation models, and modern AI architectures, with hands‑on experience delivering Generative AI solutions.
- Proven expertise in agentic AI systems, including tool‑using agents, multi‑step workflows, reasoning/planning loops, and human‑in‑the‑loop patterns.
- Strong software engineering fundamentals: API and service design, modular architecture, secure coding practices, code reviews, and production readiness.
- Experience with AI orchestration patterns such as retrieval‑augmented generation (RAG), workflow‑based AI systems, and prompt/model lifecycle management.
- Practical experience with testing, monitoring, and observability for AI systems, including regression testing, controlled rollouts, and issue triage.
- Hands‑on understanding of cloud platforms and AI infrastructure, including scalability, latency, reliability, and cost trade‑offs.
- Familiarity with vector databases/vector stores, AI platform constructs (gateways, guardrails, auditability), and Responsible AI practices embedded into delivery.
- Work Hours: 11.30AM IST to 8.30PM IST Equal Opportunity Statement Evernorth is an Equal Opportunity Employer actively encouraging and supporting organization-wide involvement of staff in diversity, equity
- inclusion efforts to educate, inform and advance both internal practices and external work with diverse client populations.
- About Evernorth Health Services Evernorth Health Services, a division of The Cigna Group, creates pharmacy, care and benefit solutions to improve health and increase vitality.
- We relentlessly innovate to make the prediction, prevention and treatment of illness and disease more accessible to millions of people.
- Join us in driving growth and improving lives.