Director, Health Data Science
About this role
FL113 requires leadership to bridge the gap between complex health data science research and real-world clinical deployment, solving the challenge of how to build AI diagnostics that uncover disease before it becomes visible and earn trust in practice. The Director of Health Data Science owns the scientific agenda, guiding the transition of models from research prototypes through clinical validation and into production alongside engineering and product teams.
Operating within the Flagship Pioneering ecosystem in Cambridge, MA, this individual will design retrospective and prospective clinical studies, establish real-world evidence strategies, and recruit a multidisciplinary research organization. A successful candidate combines deep technical expertise in machine learning and causal inference with pragmatic entrepreneurial judgment, thriving in zero-to-one environments where scientific rigor meets fast-moving venture creation.
What you will do
- Shape and continuously evolve a multi-year research roadmap spanning predictive modeling, causal inference, and longitudinal analysis.
- Define scientific acceptance criteria and productization requirements in close partnership with Engineering and Product.
- Design and oversee retrospective and prospective clinical studies with health-system partners to evaluate model performance and clinical utility.
- Oversee model development across structured and unstructured health data while ensuring fit-for-purpose standards for data quality and reproducibility.
- Recruit, mentor, and lead a multidisciplinary team spanning machine learning, clinical research, biostatistics, and health economics.
- Establish the real-world evidence strategy required to support regulatory pathways, customer adoption, and commercial growth.
What you need
- Hold a PhD or master's degree in biostatistics, computational biology, epidemiology, mathematics, computer science, or a related quantitative discipline.
- Bring at least 8 years of experience across AI research, health data science, clinical evidence generation, or product development.
- Demonstrate hands-on expertise in machine learning for structured and unstructured health data, including deep learning, survival analysis, and causal inference.
- Possess proven experience taking clinical AI models from research through real-world validation and into production.
- Show fluency with modern research tools and programming languages such as Python, PyTorch, and scikit-learn.
- Display strong working knowledge of diverse health data sources including electronic health records, claims, omics, wearables, and digital biomarkers.
Skills and tech stack
Questions candidates ask
Where is this position located?
This role is based in Cambridge, MA USA.
What is the salary range for this role?
The salary range is $192,000 - $253,000.
What tools and technologies are used in this role?
The tech stack and tools include Python, PyTorch, scikit-learn, AI-enabled development workflows, and healthcare data standards such as FHIR, HL7, OMOP, SNOMED, LOINC, ICD, CPT, and RxNorm.
What kind of team will this person lead?
You will recruit, lead, and develop a multidisciplinary team spanning machine learning, clinical research, real-world evidence, biostatistics, and health economics.
The application is on the official Flagship Pioneering, Inc. careers page.
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