Principal Data Scientist

Optum is a global organization that delivers care, aided by technology to help millions of people live healthier lives. The work you do with our team will directly improve health outcomes by connecting people with the care, pharmacy benefits, data and resources they need to feel their best. Here, you will find a culture guided by inclusion, talented peers, comprehensive benefits and career development opportunities. Come make an impact on the communities we serve as you help us advance health optimization on a global scale. Join us to start Caring. Connecting. Growing together.

The Principal Data Scientist is responsible for the creation of analytic and statistical methods, design of predictive models, and the integration of methods and models into commercially available analytic products. Knowledge of statistics, machine learning, programming, data modeling, simulation, and advanced mathematics will be used to identify opportunities, explore business questions, and make valuable discoveries for prototype development and product improvement.

Primary Responsibilities:

•  Lead team on data science projects to design and implement models and experiments from end to end, including data ingestion and preparation, feature engineering, analysis and modeling, model deployment, performance tracking and documentation
• Identify ways to improve and extend the analytic methods in our products
• Conduct hands-on data analysis and predictive analytics on large datasets
• Effectively communicate complex technical results to business partners
• Support and drive analytic efforts around machine learning and innovation
• Work with a great deal of autonomy to find solutions to complex problems
• Assign work to team members and review their work
• Subject matter expert for our clients
• Comply with the terms and conditions of the employment contract, company policies and procedures, and any and all directives (such as, but not limited to, transfer and/or re-assignment to different work locations, change in teams and/or work shifts, policies in regards to flexibility of work benefits and/or work environment, alternative work arrangements, and other decisions that may arise due to the changing business environment). The Company may adopt, vary or rescind these policies and directives in its absolute discretion and without any limitation (implied or otherwise) on its ability to do so

Required Qualifications:

• PhD or master’s degree in medical economics, Statistics, Mathematics, Healthcare Informatics, or related healthcare analytics experience
• 5+ years of experience in healthcare analytics/informatics
• 3+ years of experience with healthcare predictive modeling and/or machine learning
• 5+ years of experience with claims episode grouping and/or predictive modeling software
• Solid knowledge of administrative claims and/or clinical data accessed via large data warehouse environment
• Experience using claims and/or clinical data in applications such as: risk identification and stratification, cost and utilization reporting, provider measurement, trending, benchmarking, population health and care coordination, quality measurement or clinical outcomes.
• Experience in big data environments (e.g. Microsoft Azure, AWS, SPARK)
• Proficiency with SQL, R, Python, and/or other statistical programs
• Proficiency with MS Office suite (including Excel, Access, Word, and PowerPoint)
• Solid technical leadership and training skills. Ability to guide the work of others without a direct reporting relationship
• Solid analytical and problem-solving skills, with attention to detail
• Proven self-assured, self-motivated and results oriented
• Proven innovative/creative
• Proven excellent written and verbal communications skills
• Proven excellent collaboration and customer service skills

Preferred Qualifications:

• Experience in AWS SageMaker environment
• Experience with H2O
• Experience with Scala
• Experience with marketing analytics

At UnitedHealth Group, our mission is to help people live healthier lives and make the health system work better for everyone. We believe everyone – of every race, gender, sexuality, age, location and income – deserves the opportunity to live their healthiest life. Today, however, there are still far too many barriers to good health which are disproportionately experienced by people of color, historically marginalized groups and those with lower incomes. We are committed to mitigating our impact on the environment and enabling and delivering equitable care that addresses health disparities and improves health outcomes – an enterprise priority reflected in our mission.