Head of Generative AI
About Octopus
Octopus Energy is all about clean, green energy with transparent pricing and a relentless commitment to customer experience. Join a global team dedicated to sustainability and green tech, where energy is good for the planet and your soul 💚 Embrace flat hierarchies and an open, agile culture that fosters innovation, flexibility, and creativity. At Octopus, great people get stuff done, all whilst being themselves.
About the role
Octopus was founded with a mission to use technology to accelerate us towards a low-carbon future. That’s why we created Kraken - our own technology platform from scratch which now serves over 70 Million households and is a core reason why Octopus is the number one energy supplier in the UK.
We have been using GenAI in live, customer-facing environments since 2022, including one system that creates tens of thousands of high-quality emails for our Energy Specialists, combining our deep knowledge of the energy industry and the Octo communication style with customer-specific data from Kraken.
We are looking for an experienced AI Lead to drive our use of GenAI to the next level, building and executing a strategy to keep us at the forefront of tech innovation in the energy space. In particular, the successful candidate would start as a hands-on builder, whilst building out a strong team around them to deliver upon an ambitious strategy.
You’ll work on developing solutions that genuinely move us closer to Net Zero in a company passionate about building great technology to change the way customers use energy.
What you'll do
Technical Leadership
Lead the design, development, and deployment of production-grade agentic workflows and multi-model architectures
Stay across the latest advancements in AI and machine learning to ensure we stay at the forefront of technology
Oversee the technical architecture and ensure scalability, reliability, and security of AI systems
Drive LLMOps best practices, focusing on model evaluation, hallucination mitigation, data privacy, and token cost optimisation.
Strategic Management
Develop and execute a strategic roadmap for AI initiatives aligned with the company’s goals alongside our technology and strategy teams
Identify and manage strategic partnerships with technology providers, research labs, and other stakeholders
Evaluate and integrate third-party AI services and solutions, as needed
Communicate complex AI concepts to non-technical stakeholders to facilitate understanding and decision making
Team Development & delivery
Build, lead and mentor a high performing AI team
Oversee the planning, execution, and delivery of strategic AI projects
Ensure the foundations of our AI solutions are robust
The ideal candidate will be...
Hands-on GenAI builder
Experience moving GenAI from proof-of-concept to scaled, production-grade systems that drive measurable impact
A deep technical understanding of the problems being solved, with the ability to go hands-on if required
Note: this experience could be from delivering a transformational product at an enterprise, or developing innovative products at a startup
Exceptional leader
Proven leadership experience, with a track record of managing and developing high-performing teams
A product-focused mindset with the ability to translate complex AI capabilities into user friendly experiences, including proven experience leading the direction of tool development
The ability to both get into the nitty gritty with developers and translate complex concepts to non-technical audiences, as a plus enjoying doing technical talks at conferences
Passionate about the future of AI
Knowledge of AI ethics and the evolving regulatory landscape
A close follower of the trends at the cutting edge of GenAI development & implementation
Data & ML pay context
Based on 1,536 disclosed Data & ML salaries on RoleSuite, the role pays a median of $162K/year, with most offers between $127K and $202K (10th–90th percentile: $102K–$246K).
See the full Data & ML salary breakdown →