Applied Scientist II and Senior Applied Scientists (Multiple Positions) - Viva, People Skills Intelligence Team

Applied Scientist II and Senior Applied Scientists- Viva, People Skills Intelligence team

People Skills, a powerful new data layer in Microsoft 365 Copilot, Microsoft 365 and the Viva portfolio of apps and services. People Skills enables Copilot and the Skills agent to understand the backbone of your company – your people. This innovative new grounding source augments the critical work context already built into Copilot to produce the first generative AI experience to deeply understand both your business and your people.  

People Skills Intelligence team is the think tank behind the inferencing engine, knowledge graphs and production of people intelligence grounding data. We are seeking Applied Scientist II and Senior Applied Scientists to join our team of AI Engineers, Applied Scientists and Data Scientists. If you are interested in being part of a team that bridges the gap between research and product to help our customers thrive in the age of AI, come join us! 

In these roles, you will collaborate with other Applied Scientists, Researchers, Engineers, and Product Managers to deliver high-quality features and products that enable organizations to adopt AI and agentic technologies and measure their impact on desired business outcomes. You will also conduct cutting-edge applied research leading to high product impact and publish your work in top-tier conferences and journals. This opportunity will allow you to accelerate your career growth, develop deep business acumen, and hone your scientific skills. We value work-life balance and support our team members to achieve their personal and professional goals. 

If you are passionate about creating technology that helps people achieve more, we would love to hear from you. Join us and help shape the future of productivity. 

Microsoft’s mission is to empower every person and every organization on the planet to achieve more. As employees we come together with a growth mindset, innovate to empower others, and collaborate to realize our shared goals. Each day we build on our values of respect, integrity, and accountability to create a culture of inclusion where everyone can thrive at work and beyond.

Responsibilities

• Develop business and product requirements: Work closely with Product Managers and Engineering teams to incorporate state-of-the-art AI research to formulate plans that will meet business goals and customer needs. Deeply engage with ongoing product development to ensure and facilitate integration of AI research into the product lifecycle. 
• Conduct cutting-edge applied AI research: Understand tools, technologies, and methods being used in the AI community that can be utilized to improve product quality, performance, or efficiency. Analyze latest innovations in the academic AI research community and join with market trends to influence future product vision in People Skills and accelerate new investments. 
• Explore opportunities for innovation leading to high product impact and publish your work in top-tier conferences and journals. 
• Ensure customer-centric approach: Ensure that AI research and product development are aligned with customer needs and expectations. Engage with customers to gather feedback and insights, and incorporate these into the research and development process to enhance product relevance and satisfaction. 
• Collaborate with cross-functional teams: Work with applied scientists, researchers, engineers, designers, and product managers to drive People Skills projects through their entire life cycle from idea creation through user need establishment, scientific literature review, rigorous science experiments, evaluation and customer validation of concepts, integration into product workstreams, general availability and iterative improvement to reach desired outcomes for our customers. 
• Collaborate on AI research: Work with researchers throughout the company to explore open questions pertinent to the product at various stages of impact; identify paths to transfer AI research results into product features and create cross-org workstreams to influence product directions for greater impact. 
• Mentor and demonstrate leadership: Mentor others, demonstrate leadership capabilities, participate in onboarding new team members, collaborate with the academic community, and identify new AI research talent to join Microsoft. 
• Uphold AI credibility: Establish credibility for Microsoft both internally and externally through participation in companywide initiatives related to the future of work, synthesizing relevant AI research findings from in-house projects and collaborations, contribute to scholarly articles, and give internal and external talks to showcase Viva Insight’s commitment to developing features that are AI research-backed and data-powered. 

Qualifications

Required Qualifications: 

• Bachelor's Degree in Statistics, Econometrics, Computer Science, Electrical or Computer Engineering, or related field AND 2+ years related experience (e.g., statistics, predictive analytics, research)
  • OR Master's Degree in Statistics, Econometrics, Computer Science, Electrical or Computer Engineering, or related field AND 1+ year(s) related experience (e.g., statistics, predictive analytics, research)
  • OR Doctorate in Statistics, Econometrics, Computer Science, Electrical or Computer Engineering, or related field
  • OR equivalent experience.
• 2+ years experience demonstrating proficiency in real world applications of Foundation Models, domain adaptation of Foundation Models (e.g. fine-tuning LLMs/SLMs), Agentic Systems, Natural language processing, Prompt tuning. 
• 2+ years experience programming in Python and experience with machine learning frameworks (e.g., TensorFlow, PyTorch).  

Preferred Qualifications:

• Bachelor's Degree in Statistics, Econometrics, Computer Science, Electrical or Computer Engineering, or related field AND 4+ years related experience (e.g., statistics, predictive analytics, research)
  • OR Master's Degree in Statistics, Econometrics, Computer Science, Electrical or Computer Engineering, or related field AND 3+ year(s) related experience (e.g., statistics, predictive analytics, research)
  • OR Doctorate in Statistics, Econometrics, Computer Science, Electrical or Computer Engineering, or related field AND 1+ year(s) related experience (e.g., statistics, predictive analytics, research)
  • OR equivalent experience.

• 3+ years demonstrating proficiency in real world applications of Foundation Models, domain adaptation of Foundation Models (e.g. fine-tuning LLMs/SLMs), Agentic Systems, Natural language processing, Prompt tuning. 
• 3+ years experience programming in Python and experience with machine learning frameworks (e.g., TensorFlow, PyTorch).  
• Demonstrated ability to think unconventionally to derive creative and innovative solutions especially for ambiguous projects with incomplete data. 
• Expertise in incubation and experimentation, with a focus on leveraging behavioral collaboration data to solve strategic business problems. 
• Problem-solving skills and ability to join qualitative and quantitative thinking with an obsession for improving our customer experience. 
•  Demonstrated experience communicating complex analysis & insights to senior leaders, business decision makers, practitioners or academic researchers. 
• Published research in top-tier AI/ML or HCI/HAI conferences (e.g., NeurIPS, ACL, CHI etc). 

Applied Sciences IC3 - The typical base pay range for this role across the U.S. is USD $98,300 - $193,200 per year.
There is a different range applicable to specific work locations, within the San Francisco Bay area and New York City metropolitan area, and the base pay range for this role in those locations is USD $127,200 - $208,800 per year.

Applied Sciences IC4 - The typical base pay range for this role across the U.S. is USD $117,200 - $229,200 per year.
There is a different range applicable to specific work locations, within the San Francisco Bay area and New York City metropolitan area, and the base pay range for this role in those locations is USD $153,600 - $250,200 per year.

Certain roles may be eligible for benefits and other compensation. Find additional benefits and pay information here: https://careers.microsoft.com/us/en/us-corporate-pay


Microsoft will accept applications and processes offers for these roles on an ongoing basis.

Microsoft is an equal opportunity employer. All qualified applicants will receive consideration for employment without regard to age, ancestry, color, family or medical care leave, gender identity or expression, genetic information, marital status, medical condition, national origin, physical or mental disability, political affiliation, protected veteran status, race, religion, sex (including pregnancy), sexual orientation, or any other characteristic protected by applicable laws, regulations and ordinances.  We also consider qualified applicants regardless of criminal histories, consistent with legal requirements. If you need assistance and/or a reasonable accommodation due to a disability during the application or the recruiting process, please send a request via the Accommodation request form.

Benefits/perks listed below may vary depending on the nature of your employment with Microsoft and the country where you work.

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