Research Engineer (Evals) in London

Research Engineer (Evals) in London

London Full-Time 60000 - 80000 £ / year (est.) Home office (partial)
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At a Glance

  • Tasks: Build and maintain benchmarks for AI safety and agent behaviours.
  • Company: Join White Circle, an innovative AI Safety company with a mission to optimise AI systems.
  • Benefits: Enjoy paid time off, comprehensive medical insurance, and hybrid work options.
  • Other info: Collaborative team environment with opportunities for career growth and exciting off-sites.
  • Why this job: Make a real impact on AI safety while working with cutting-edge technology.
  • Qualifications: Experience in LLM benchmarks, Python coding, and AI model evaluation.

The predicted salary is between 60000 - 80000 £ per year.

TLDR

We’re looking for a research engineer to build and maintain our internal suite of benchmarks, covering single/multi-turn content and agentic guardrails.

The research engineer would also work with the team on projects studying agent behaviours in the wild.

About us

White Circle is an AI Safety company building the safety, reliability, and optimization layer for AI systems.

At the core of our platform are policies – simple natural-language rules that define what an AI model should and shouldn’t do.

We automatically test, enforce, and continuously improve these policies at scale.

  • We’ve raised $11M from top funds, founders, and senior leaders at Open AI, Anthropic, Hugging Face, Mistral, Deep Mind, Datadog, Sentry, and others
  • We process over 100M+ API calls every month
  • We fine-tune and train our own LLMs so they run faster and cheaper than any open or proprietary model

We’re a small, highly focused team.

If you want to work deeply on hard problems, see your work ship to production quickly, and influence how AI safety is actually built – you’re the one we need.

About the team

White Circle's fundamental research team works on the science of how AI systems fail in the real world: where agents break, how misalignment actually looks like to the end user, and how it is present in the model internals.

We build the evals, benchmarks, environments, and tooling that empirically study high-impact agent reliability concerns — some of which become the guardrails shipped in our products, and some of which become public writeups.

You will

  • Own and maintain our internal benchmark suite, covering single/multi-turn content guardrails and agentic safety.
  • Build benchmarks that distinguish specific model capabilities.
  • Work with the product team to build evals covering core functionality of our flagship models.
  • Build benchmarks for new features coming out of the research team.
  • Adapt and extend evals to new verticals and changing product data.
  • Work on research projects that study and quantify realistic agentic and LLM failure modes in the wild.

You’ll fit right in if you

  • Have built an LLM benchmark from scratch that distinguished specific model capabilities (i. e., produced a measurable, defensible capability difference, not just a score).
  • Have built synthetic data for post-training textual or multimodal models.
  • Can reproduce a published benchmark result and identify where the original methodology is fragile or misleading.
  • You write Python that other people can build on.

Our whole stack is Python; we want someone who has shipped and maintained production code and who factors messy problems into clean abstractions others can extend.

  • You can write efficient LLM inference setups, including sensible orchestration of parallel calls, retries, rate-limit handling.
  • An AI power‑user — fluent with frontier models and coding agents day to day.

A big plus

  • Automated red‑teaming experience
  • Have worked across a range of agentic scaffolds and reproduced public benchmark results on them
  • Strong knowledge of existing reward‑model / monitoring / safety benchmarks
  • One or more published papers in the evals / safety‑evaluation space
  • Why White Circle
  • Paid time off in line with your local regulations, no matter where you work from.
  • Work from Paris (hybrid) with a relocation package available, or work from London – note: we are unable to provide relocation support or private medical insurance for London‑based roles for now.
  • Comprehensive medical insurance for our France‑based team
  • All the hardware, tools, and services you need
  • Covered subscriptions for AI agents and IDEs
  • Team off‑sites twice a year: we’ve recently been to the Alps and to Saint‑Tropez
  • How we hire
  • Introductory call with HR (25 min)
  • Take‑home test task
  • Technical interview with Head of Fundamental Research (60 min)
  • Final conversation with our CEO (45 min)

Please submit your application in English.

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Contact Details:

White Circle Recruitment Team

StudySmarter Expert Advice🤫

We think this is how you could land Research Engineer (Evals) in London

Get Involved in Research Communities

Dive headfirst into the scientific research world by joining relevant communities and forums. Engage in discussions, share your insights, and even attend conferences or seminars in your field. This not only boosts your visibility but can also lead to potential job opportunities—don't forget to connect with like-minded folks!

Show Off Your Research Projects

Have you worked on any cool research projects? Make it easy for potential employers to see your work by creating a portfolio or a personal website. This way, when you apply for roles like the one at White Circle, you can point them to your projects and publications, showcasing your expertise directly.

Utilise Professional Networks

Networking is key in scientific research. Join professional bodies or organisations related to your field. They often have job boards and resources tailored for job seekers. Make connections with professionals who may know about openings or can give you tips on landing a full-time position.

Keep Your Eyes on Openings & Apply Directly

Don’t just rely on job boards! Keep an eye on the careers section of the websites of companies like White Circle. Apply directly through their website because sometimes they post jobs there before anywhere else. Plus, it shows your proactive approach!

We think you need these skills to ace Research Engineer (Evals) in London

Benchmark Development
Python Programming
LLM Inference Setup
Data Synthesis
Research Methodology
Agentic Safety Knowledge
Automated Red-Teaming

Some tips for your application 🫡

Highlight Your Research Experience:When applying for a full-time role in scientific research, make sure to emphasise your research experience prominently in your CV. Share specific projects you’ve worked on, the methodologies you used, and any significant findings. If you’ve published papers or presented at conferences, definitely include that too – it shows you’re on it in the academic world!

Tailor Your Cover Letter to the Research Area:Your cover letter should reflect your passion for the specific area of research at White Circle. Mention relevant experiences that align with the organisation’s goals or projects. This shows that you’ve done your homework and are genuinely interested in the position – plus, it helps us see how you’d fit into the team dynamics.

Showcase Your Data Analysis Skills:In scientific research, data analysis skills are a big deal! Make sure to detail any relevant analytical tools or software you’re familiar with, like R, Python, or statistical packages. Employers are keen to know you can handle the data-heavy elements of the role, so add specific examples where you’ve used these skills effectively.

Discuss Your Future Research Goals:In your motivation section, it’s a great idea to talk about your future research goals and how they align with the work being done at White Circle. This shows that you’re not just looking for any job, but rather a chance to contribute meaningfully to the field. We love to see applicants who are forward-thinking and enthusiastic about their research journey!

How to prepare for a job interview at White Circle

Showcase Your Research Skills

In scientific research, it’s crucial to demonstrate your ability to design and conduct experiments. Come armed with examples of past projects where you've developed hypotheses, collected data, and analysed results. Be ready to discuss any specific methodologies or tools you’ve used, like PCR techniques or statistical software.

Prepare for Technical Questions

Expect some technical questions specific to your field. Make sure you're up to speed with recent advancements in scientific research related to the role at White Circle. Brush up on concepts relevant to their projects and be prepared to discuss how you would approach a specific research problem or challenge they might face.

Know Your Publications

If you've authored or co-authored any papers, be prepared to discuss them! Highlighting your contributions to published research can really set you apart. It shows not only your expertise but also your ability to communicate complex ideas clearly, which is key in scientific research roles.

Exhibit Your Team Spirit

In full-time roles, collaboration is often at the heart of scientific research. Prepare examples that show how you've successfully worked in teams, dealt with conflicts, or contributed to group projects. We want to know how you can work effectively with the team at White Circle to drive research projects forward.