Lead Research Engineer at Atla in London, England, GB

About Atla

Atla is committed to engineering safe, beneficial AI systems that will have a massive positive impact on the future of humanity. We are a London-based start-up building the most capable AI evaluation models. Become part of our growing world-class team, backed by Y Combinator, Creandum, and the founders of Reddit, Cruise, Rappi, Instacart and more.

Role

As Atla’s Lead Research Engineer, you’ll lead frontier research into training large language models, and advance the state of the art in AI safety research. As part of your role, you will:

• Steer LLMs to become strong evaluators aligned with human preferences using advanced post-training techniques.
• Define and execute an ambitious research agenda that advances Atla's position as a leader in language model evaluation.
• Develop comprehensive evaluation frameworks, including tooling, datasets and metrics for rigorous assessment of alignment and safety risks.
• Contribute significant findings to leading AI safety conferences and journals.

Please note that this role is in-person (we can sponsor visas and offer international relocation support as a UK AI Futures partner!)

Qualifications

Proven AI research leadership:

• Track record of 5+ years in pioneering AI research, with significant contributions to the field of LLMs, evidenced by publications in top-tier conferences and journals.
• Proven experience in defining and executing research agendas, demonstrating the ability to guide and align a team toward achieving ambitious research goals.
• Deep expertise in training and evaluating language models across GPUs, preferably in PyTorch.
• Experience at elite AI research lab (OpenAI, DeepMind, Meta, Anthropic, Cohere, etc.).

Nice to have

• Experience at a fast growing startup.
• Strong software, ML engineering expertise with a focus on building robust, scalable system.

About you

You'll work by and thrive through our core principles:

Own the Outcome

• Create real value: Every action should deliver tangible, meaningful value for the people who use what we build.
• Drive to completion: Do the second 90%.
• Do fewer things, better: Prioritize focus over breadth.

Back the Team

• Collaborate for excellence: The whole is greater than the sum of its parts.
• Seek truth: Let the best ideas win, no matter where they come from, and let go of ego.
• Argue passionately, then commit fully: Debate fiercely, but once a decision is made, own it like it’s yours.

Drive the Mission

• Advance AI safety: Every action should contribute towards the safe development of AI.
• Go big or go home: “The people who are crazy enough to think they can change the world are the ones who do.”

Compensation

• £200K - £300K
• Significant stake in equity as one of our core technical leaders
• Pension plan with employer contributions
• Medical, dental, and vision benefits

Join our driven founding team to make a dent in the universe by engineering safe, beneficial AI systems!

“This role is supported by AI Futures Grants, a UK Government scheme designed to help the next generation of AI leaders meet the costs of relocating to the UK. AI Futures Grants provide financial support to reimburse relocation costs such as visa fees, the immigration health surcharge and travel/subsistence expenses. Successful candidates for this role may be able to get up to £10,000 to meet relocations costs, subject to terms and conditions.”