Machine Learning Engineer - MI6 - HEO

Location: London

At MI6 (the Secret Intelligence Service), we’re investing heavily in artificial intelligence and machine learning to strengthen how we operate today and prepare for the challenges of tomorrow. As a Machine Learning Engineer, you’ll be a key part of that transformation.

You’ll be working at the point where machine learning moves into live, operational use, designing, deploying and maintaining robust capabilities in environments where quality, resilience and trust are paramount.

What you’ll be working on

In this hands‑on and highly influential role, you will:

• Design, build and operate mission‑critical machine learning systems
• Own the end‑to‑end ML lifecycle, from training and fine‑tuning through to deployment and live monitoring
• Act as the bridge between research and production, ensuring models are reliable, scalable and fit for purpose
• Shape and improve MLOps practices, infrastructure and workflows
• Champion explainable, ethical and transparent AI as core engineering principles
• Collaborate with data scientists, researchers, software engineers and hosting specialists
• Support and mentor other engineers, helping to raise ML capability across teams

Who we’re looking for

You might be:

• A Machine Learning Engineer with end‑to‑end deployment experience
• A Software Engineer who has built and run applied ML systems
• A Data Scientist with strong engineering and mathematical foundations

What matters most is that you:

• Understand the full ML lifecycle
• Have experience deploying, monitoring and optimising models in live environments
• Are comfortable working with MLOps tooling, cloud platforms and Python
• Can work calmly with ambiguity and think beyond the immediate task
• Communicate clearly and collaborate well within technical communities

Experience with tools such as Weights & Biases, Docker or Kubernetes is helpful, but not essential.

Important to know

Due to the nature of the work, the role is based in London, and the recruitment process includes enhanced security checks.

Find out more & apply

View the full job description and apply via Civil Service Jobs