Principal Security Ops Analyst

Principal Security Ops Analyst Syneos Health® is a leading fully-integrated life sciences services organization built to accelerate customer success. We partner with innovators at every point across the drug development and commercialization continuum, helping them navigate complexity, anticipate change and accelerate progress. Every day we perform better because of how we work together, as one team, each the best at what we do. We bring together talented experts across a broad spectrum of business critical corporate functions. Every role plays an essential part in enabling our customers to achieve their goals. Our teams are agile, collaborative, and committed to delivering—for each other, for our customers, and ultimately for the people who rely on the services we support. Discover what your 25,000 future colleagues already know: Why Syneos Health • We are passionate about developing our people, through career development and progression; supportive and engaged line management; technical and therapeutic area training; peer recognition and total rewards program. • We are committed to building an inclusive culture – where you can authentically be yourself. Central to this is our purpose – Driven to Deliver – which captures the passion of our colleagues to show up each day and shape solutions that have the ability to dramatically impact someone’s life. • We are continuously building the company we all want to work for and our customers want to work with. Why? Because we know that when we bring together smart colleagues from across the world, we can shape the future of healthcare, driving impact for customers and defining the pace of patient progress. Job Responsibilities ​ JOB RESPONSIBILITIES Lead implementation and operationalization of enterprise AI security tools and controls across Microsoft Copilot, Azure OpenAI, Foundry, Gemini Enterprise, Claude, AWS Bedrock, and other sanctioned AI platforms. Design, deploy, and maintain AI security guardrails including prompt injection protection, jailbreak detection, content filtering, sensitive-data protection, and runtime safety controls. Develop and maintain standardized AI security baselines, system prompts, security patterns, and reusable guardrail configurations for enterprise use cases. Operationalize AI security technologies including Microsoft Defender for Cloud AI Services, Model Armor, Zscaler AI Guard, CASB controls, API gateway protections, and AI telemetry integrations. Build and mature AI threat detection and response capabilities by integrating AI security telemetry into Sentinel and Cyber Threat Defense workflows. Develop AI-specific security monitoring use cases, detection logic, alerting strategies, investigation runbooks, and containment procedures. Establish and execute a repeatable AI red teaming program focused on prompt injection, jailbreak attacks, sensitive data leakage, unsafe outputs, agent misuse, model abuse, and guardrail bypass testing. Design red team methodologies, testing frameworks, playbooks, rules of engagement, and evidence collection procedures for AI systems and agents. Execute adversarial testing against AI models, agents, copilots, retrieval-augmented generation (RAG) solutions, and AI-enabled applications prior to production deployment. Assess AI platforms and applications against OWASP LLM Top 10, CSA AI Controls, NIST AI RMF, and internal security standards. Analyze AI-related findings, identify root causes, prioritize risk, and provide actionable remediation guidance to engineering and product teams. Partner with AI developers and architects to implement secure-by-design AI patterns including pre-processing and post-processing controls, safety checkpoints, MCP governance, and tool-access restrictions. Conduct security architecture reviews of AI solutions, agents, AI-assisted workflows, and external AI integrations. Support enterprise AI governance initiatives including AI inventory, AI asset discovery, AI risk assessment, and non-human identity governance initiatives. Develop metrics, dashboards, and executive reporting that demonstrate AI security posture, AI risk reduction, guardrail effectiveness, and red team outcomes. Coordinate with Cyber Threat Defense, Security Operations, Cloud Operations, Enterprise Architecture, AI Governance, and application teams to operationalize AI security controls and response processes. Evaluate emerging AI security technologies, AI gateways, AI firewalls, AI posture management solutions, and AI security tooling to support the evolving AI security roadmap. Create and maintain SOPs, runbooks, and process documentation. ​ Ensure consistency across teams and shifts in how security tasks are performed. Partner with SOC analysts, cyber threat intelligence & incident response, vulnerability managers, network engineers and others to understand pain points and requirements. ​ Work within Tech Solutions, DevOps, and compliance teams to align security processes with broader organizational goals. ​ Mentor and coach team members on best practices and process adherence. ​ Lead initiatives for process maturity (e.g., adopting industry standard frameworks, improving alert triage). ​ Stay current with industry best practices and emerging technologies. ​ Ensure processes meet regulatory and policy requirements. ​ Support internal and external audits by providing process evidence and documentation. Qualification Requirements 8+ years in cybersecurity, security engineering, cloud security, application security, or security operations. 3+ years designing or securing AI/ML, Generative AI, LLM, agent-based, or cloud-native applications. Experience with Microsoft Security, Azure AI/Foundry, Defender for Cloud, Sentinel, Zscaler, CASB, GCP, AWS, and modern security monitoring platforms. Deep understanding of prompt injection , jailbreak attacks, LLM security risks, agentic AI security, RAG security, data leakage controls, and AI adversarial testing. Strong written and verbal communication skills with the ability to operate at both technical and executive levels. ​ Self-directed and able to manage individual projects or work as part of a larger team. ​ Highly technical, detail-oriented, and organized individual with advanced skills in incident response and threat hunting. Preferred: Proficiency in a wide range of security tools such as vulnerability scanning, endpoint protection/EDR, SIEM, SOAR, IPS/IDS, WAF, SASE, perimeter firewall , reverse proxy, defense in depth practices, malware analysis tools, etc. ​ Programming experience in bash, python, or PowerShell. ​ Prior experience in the healthcare or pharmaceutical industry. Get to know Syneos Health Over the past 5 years, we have worked with 94% of all Novel FDA Approved Drugs, 95% of EMA Authorized Products and over 200 Studies across 73,000 Sites and 675,000+ Trial patients. No matter what your role is, you’ll take the initiative and challenge the status quo with us in a highly competitive and ever-changing environment. Learn more about Syneos Health. Additional Information Tasks, duties, and responsibilities as listed in this job description are not exhaustive. The Company, at its sole discretion and with no prior notice, may assign other tasks, duties, and job responsibilities. Equivalent experience, skills, and/or education will also be considered so qualifications of incumbents may differ from those listed in the Job Description. The Company, at its sole discretion, will determine what constitutes as equivalent to the qualifications described above. Further, nothing contained herein should be construed to create an employment contract. Occasionally, required skills/experiences for jobs are expressed in brief terms. Any language contained herein is intended to fully comply with all obligations imposed by the legislation of each country in which it operates, including the implementation of the EU Equality Directive, in relation to the recruitment and employment of its employees. The Company is committed to compliance with the Americans with Disabilities Act, including the provision of reasonable accommodations, when appropriate, to assist employees or applicants to perform the essential functions of the job.