Senior Principal, Forward Deployed Engineer

Shape the Future of AI in Healthcare

At Cigna, we use technology, data, and human insight to improve how people access and experience care. As a Senior Principal, Forward Deployed Engineer, you will serve as the technical leader for AI innovation within the AQUA organization. You will partner directly with business leaders to identify high-impact opportunities, design scalable AI solutions, and establish the engineering standards that enable teams to deliver measurable outcomes.

This is a highly visible leadership role where strategic thinking, technical excellence, and stakeholder influence come together to transform complex business challenges into practical AI-powered solutions.

Responsibilities

Drive AI Strategy and Technical Excellence

• Define the AI architecture, engineering standards, and reusable solution patterns that accelerate delivery across the AQUA portfolio.
• Lead the design and implementation of complex AI solutions, ensuring they are scalable, secure, reliable, and production-ready.
• Evaluate and apply the most effective technologies, including LLMs, RAG architectures, agentic systems, machine learning, and hybrid approaches.
• Establish best practices for evaluation, observability, governance, risk management, and cost optimization.
• Create reusable frameworks, documentation, and playbooks that improve delivery quality and speed across engagements.

Partner with the Business to Deliver Outcomes

• Collaborate closely with business stakeholders to identify opportunities where AI can create measurable value.
• Guide engagements from discovery and solution design through delivery and operational transition.
• Translate complex business requirements into practical technical solutions with clear success criteria.
• Provide executive-level updates on progress, risks, outcomes, and strategic recommendations.
• Make informed decisions in ambiguous situations while balancing business priorities, technical feasibility, and long-term value.

Influence, Mentor, and Scale

• Serve as the trusted technical advisor for senior leadership and key stakeholders.
• Lead architectural reviews, strategy discussions, and cross-functional alignment efforts.
• Mentor Principal and senior engineers, raising technical standards and fostering a culture of excellence.
• Identify repeatable solutions that can evolve into broader enterprise capabilities and platforms.
• Strengthen collaboration across product, engineering, security, legal, compliance, and data science teams.

Required Qualifications

• 12+ years of software engineering, AI/ML engineering, or related experience, including leadership of complex enterprise initiatives.
• Deep expertise in AI engineering, including large language models, RAG architectures, agentic workflows, model evaluation, and production AI systems.
• Strong proficiency in Python and experience with enterprise technologies such as SQL, Java, TypeScript, or Go.
• Experience building, deploying, and operating AI/ML solutions in AWS, Azure, or GCP environments.
• Proven success defining technical strategy and influencing outcomes across multiple teams and stakeholders.
• Strong understanding of responsible AI principles, including privacy, security, governance, human oversight, and risk mitigation.
• Exceptional communication skills with the ability to engage technical, business, and executive audiences.
• Demonstrated ability to lead initiatives in highly matrixed, complex organizations.

Preferred Qualifications

• Experience in healthcare, insurance, pharmacy, clinical, or care management environments.
• Experience in forward-deployed engineering, solutions engineering, technical consulting, or customer-facing technology leadership roles.
• Experience leading discovery workshops, design sprints, or product strategy engagements.
• Familiarity with HIPAA, model risk management frameworks, and AI governance practices.
• Experience with Azure OpenAI, AWS Bedrock, Google Vertex AI, Anthropic, or open-source AI platforms.
• Bachelor's degree in Computer Science, Engineering, Data Science, or a related field; advanced degree preferred.
• Experience building reusable AI platforms, developer enablement capabilities, or enterprise AI accelerators.

This role is ideal for a technical leader who thrives at the intersection of AI innovation, business strategy, and engineering excellence—and who is excited to shape how AI creates meaningful outcomes across healthcare.

If you will be working at home occasionally or permanently, the internet connection must be obtained through a cable broadband or fiber optic internet service provider with speeds of at least 10Mbps download/5Mbps upload.

For this position, we anticipate offering an annual salary of 173,900 - 289,900 USD / yearly, depending on relevant factors, including experience and geographic location.

This role is also anticipated to be eligible to participate in an annual bonus and long term incentive plan.

At The Cigna Group, you’ll enjoy a comprehensive range of benefits, with a focus on supporting your whole health. Starting on day one of your employment, you’ll be offered several health-related benefits including medical, vision, dental, and well-being and behavioral health programs. We also offer 401(k), company paid life insurance, tuition reimbursement, a minimum of 18 days of paid time off per year, paid holidays, and leaves of absence. For more details on our employee benefits programs, click here.

About The Cigna Group

Doing something meaningful starts with a simple decision, a commitment to changing lives. At The Cigna Group, we’re dedicated to improving the health and vitality of those we serve. Through our divisions Cigna Healthcare and Evernorth Health Services, we are committed to enhancing the lives of our clients, customers and patients. Join us in driving growth and improving lives.

Qualified applicants will be considered without regard to race, color, age, disability, sex, childbirth (including pregnancy) or related medical conditions including but not limited to lactation, sexual orientation, gender identity or expression, veteran or military status, religion, national origin, ancestry, marital or familial status, genetic information, status with regard to public assistance, citizenship status or any other characteristic protected by applicable equal employment opportunity laws.

If you need a reasonable accommodation to complete the online application process, please email [email protected] for assistance.  Please note that this email inbox is dedicated to accommodation requests only and cannot provide application updates or accept resumes.

The Cigna Group has a tobacco-free policy and reserves the right not to hire tobacco/nicotine users in states where that is legally permissible. Candidates in such states who use tobacco/nicotine will not be considered for employment unless they enter a qualifying smoking cessation program prior to the start of their employment. These states include: Alabama, Alaska, Arizona, Arkansas, Delaware, Florida, Georgia, Hawaii, Idaho, Iowa, Kansas, Maryland, Massachusetts, Michigan, Nebraska, Ohio, Pennsylvania, Texas, Utah, Vermont, and Washington State.

Qualified applicants with criminal histories will be considered for employment in a manner consistent with all federal, state and local ordinances.