Senior Fine-tuning and adaptation, project

The work

Adapts existing models to a specific domain, and knows when not to.

A defined outcome with a defined end. The scope is agreed before you start, and changing it is a new conversation rather than a favour.

The bar

You have owned delivery of this work, end to end, on something that reached real users.

Why this one is hard to judge. Knowing when fine-tuning is the wrong answer is worth more than knowing how to do it, and it is harder to demonstrate.

What we ask to see

• A model you adapted, with the evaluation that justified doing it
• A time you recommended against fine-tuning and were right
• How you separated training and evaluation data, and how you checked

One solid item beats five vague ones. A referee we can actually call beats a link to a landing page.

What gets an application declined

• The only evidence offered is a certification, a course, or a job title
• Every piece of evidence is under an NDA and no sanitised version or referee is offered
• The work described is entirely a demonstration, a proof of concept, or a hackathon
• More than six disciplines are claimed, which we read as a signal that none has been assessed

If we decline you, the reason is written down and sent to you. The software refuses a decline without one.

What it pays

£500 to £738 a day. That is the tenth to ninetieth percentile of what UK employers advertised for the closest published titles over the six months to 8 August 2026.

Advertised UK contract day rates for Machine Learning Engineer, tenth to ninetieth percentile, six months to 8 August 2026. Advertised, not agreed, and set by the hirer rather than by us.