AI/ML Researcher Jobs in McLean, VA

AI and ML Data Scientist

The Opportunity:

As an Agentic AI Engineer and Data Scientist for military intelligence, you’re excited by the opportunity to design, develop, and deploy advanced AI systems that help analysts transform complex, fragmented information into actionable intelligence. You understand the possibilities created by large language models (LLMs), machine learning (ML), natural language processing (NLP), autonomous workflows, and multi-agent architectures, and you want to apply them to mission-critical national security challenges.

In today’s contested and information-rich operating environment, military intelligence teams must rapidly make sense of large volumes of structured and unstructured data from multiple sources, formats, and domains. As an AI professional at Booz Allen, you’ll help build intelligent systems that support intelligence discovery, analysis, prioritization, reporting, and decision advantage for defense and national security clients.

On our team, you’ll use your AI, data science, and software development skills to create real-world mission impact. You’ll work closely with clients, analysts, engineers, and mission stakeholders to understand operational needs, identify high-value use cases, and develop agentic AI capabilities that can reason over data, orchestrate workflows, retrieve relevant information, generate analytic products, and support human-in-the-loop decision-making. You’ll design and implement AI agents, retrieval-augmented generation pipelines, evaluation frameworks, prompt strategies, data processing workflows, and mission-focused prototypes. You’ll help ensure these systems are reliable, explainable, secure, testable, and aligned to operational requirements. Ultimately, you’ll help military intelligence organizations use AI responsibly and effectively to accelerate insight, improve analytic tradecraft, and support informed decisions.

Work with us as we develop advanced AI capabilities for the mission.

Join us. The world can’t wait.

You Have:

• Experience developing, integrating, or evaluating AI, ML, NLP, LLMs, or agentic AI capabilities for mission, operational, or enterprise use cases, and building AI-enabled applications using Python and modern AI/ML libraries or frameworks, including PyTorch, Scikit-Learn, LangChain, LlamaIndex, Hugging Face, or CUDA
• Experience developing agentic AI systems, including autonomous or semi-autonomous agents, tool-using agents, multi-step reasoning workflows, task orchestration, retrieval-augmented generation, or human-in-the-loop AI capabilities
• Experience analyzing, processing, and integrating structured and unstructured data sources, including intelligence data such as text, reports, messages, metadata, documents, or geospatial data
• Experience designing, testing, validating, or evaluating AI/ML systems, including model performance, accuracy, relevance, robustness, hallucination mitigation, or mission-aligned evaluation criteria
• Experience supporting military intelligence, defense intelligence, all-source analysis, targeting, indications and warning, collection management, operations intelligence, or national security missions, and developing AI systems for classified, air-gapped, secure, or operationally constrained environments
• Experience with prompt engineering, prompt evaluation, model benchmarking, fine-tuning, synthetic data generation, or LLM application development
• Knowledge of information retrieval, embeddings, vector databases, semantic search, data labeling, classification models, model evaluation, and data quality assessment
• Ability to translate military intelligence mission requirements into technical AI solutions, prototypes, and production-ready capabilities
• TS/SCI clearance
• Bachelor’s degree in Data Science, CS, AI, ML, Engineering, Operations Research, Applied Mathematics, or Statistics

Nice If You Have:

• Experience with distributed data, cloud, or high-performance computing tools, including Spark, Kafka, Hadoop, Hive, EMR, Databricks, Kubernetes, Docker, OpenSearch, Elasticsearch, or similar technologies
• Experience developing APIs, microservices, analytic interfaces, dashboards, or production software using FastAPI, Flask, REST services, Git, CI/CD, DevSecOps, Plotly, Dash, Streamlit, Tableau, or Power BI
• Knowledge of intelligence tradecraft, analytic standards, military operations, Joint or Combatant Command environments, the intelligence cycle, AI safety, model governance, responsible AI, explainability, auditability, access control, or data security
• Ability to collaborate with analysts, engineers, data owners, security teams, and mission stakeholders to deploy AI-enabled capabilities in operational environments
• TS/SCI clearance with a polygraph
• Master's degree in Data Science, CS, AI, ML, Engineering, Operations Research, Applied Mathematics, Statistics, or a related field
• AI, ML, Cloud Computing, Data Engineering, Cybersecurity, or DevSecOps Certification such as AWS, Azure, Google Cloud, Databricks, Kubernetes, Security+, or similar Certification

Clearance:

Applicants selected will be subject to a security investigation and may need to meet eligibility requirements for access to classified information; TS/SCI clearance is required.

Compensation

At Booz Allen, we celebrate your contributions, provide you with opportunities and choices, and support your total well-being. Our offerings include health, life, disability, financial, and retirement benefits, as well as paid leave, professional development, tuition assistance, work-life programs, and dependent care. Our recognition awards program acknowledges employees for exceptional performance and superior demonstration of our values. Full-time and part-time employees working at least 20 hours a week on a regular basis are eligible to participate in Booz Allen’s benefit programs. Individuals that do not meet the threshold are only eligible for select offerings, not inclusive of health benefits. We encourage you to learn more about our total benefits by visiting the Resource page on our Careers site and reviewing Our Employee Benefits page.

Salary at Booz Allen is determined by various factors, including but not limited to location, the individual’s particular combination of education, knowledge, skills, competencies, and experience, as well as contract-specific affordability and organizational requirements. The projected compensation range for this position is $77,600.00 to $176,000.00 (annualized USD). The estimate displayed represents the typical salary range for this position and is just one component of Booz Allen’s total compensation package for employees. This posting will close within 90 days from the Posting Date.

Identity Statement

As part of the hiring process, we will ask you to complete an identity verification process that leverages advanced biometrics and artificial intelligence to ensure authenticity and protect against identity fraud. You are expected to be on camera during interviews and assessments. We reserve the right to take your picture to verify your identity and prevent fraud.

Candidate AI Usage Policy

AI is a part of our daily work at Booz Allen, and we are committed to the responsible and ethical use of AI tools. However, we want to ensure a fair candidate process based on your own skills and knowledge. As part of this commitment, the use of artificial intelligence (AI) or other tools to assist with responses during interviews (whether in-person or virtual) is prohibited unless permission is explicitly provided.

Work Model
Our people-first culture prioritizes the benefits of collaboration, whether it occurs in person or virtually. To support engagement and effective communication, employees working virtually are generally expected to have their cameras on during meetings.

• Remote: If this position is listed as remote, there may still be occasions when you are required to work in person at a Booz Allen or customer facility.

• Hybrid: If this position is listed as hybrid, you will be expected to work from a Booz Allen facility frequently, in alignment with leadership expectations and the needs of the role. You may also be required to work from or visit a customer facility.

• Onsite: If this position is listed as onsite, work will primarily be performed at a Booz Allen office or customer facility, where employees will collaborate directly with colleagues and customers as required by the role.

Commitment to Non-Discrimination

All qualified applicants will receive consideration for employment without regard to disability, status as a protected veteran or any other status protected by applicable federal, state, local, or international law.