Lead Data Scientist

This role exists to provide technical leadership and assurance across data science, ensuring machine learning solutions are designed, built, and operated to a high and consistent technical standard. The role focuses on enabling scalable, reliable delivery of data science solutions aligned to business priorities defined elsewhere.

WHAT YOU'LL BE DOING:

• Acting as a technical lead for data science, guiding modelling approach and solution design across multiple initiatives.
• Working closely with business stakeholders to translate priority use cases into technically sound, production‑ready data science solutions.
• Providing hands‑on technical leadership across the data science lifecycle, from problem framing and modelling through deployment and ongoing optimisation.
• Defining and embedding technical standards and best practices for experimentation, validation, documentation, and reproducibility.
• Reviewing and challenging technical designs and implementations, providing clear technical direction and sign‑off.
• Supporting and mentoring data scientists on complex technical challenges.
• Partnering with Data Architecture, ML & Data Engineering, and BI teams to ensure solutions are scalable, robust, and production‑ready.
• Evaluating new techniques and tools, guiding their pragmatic adoption.
• Communicating technical assumptions, risks, and trade‑offs clearly to technical and non‑technical stakeholders.

Accountable for:

• The technical quality and consistency of data science solutions delivered within assigned domains.
• Ensuring solutions meet agreed performance, scalability, reliability, and maintainability standards.
• Consistent application of data science standards, reducing delivery risk and technical debt.
• Providing ongoing technical assurance that solutions remain fit for production as usage and complexity increase.
• Maintaining strong technical partnerships with stakeholders as a trusted advisor.
• Raising the overall technical maturity of data science within the organisation

WHAT YOU'LL NEED:

Essential Criteria:

• Extensive experience delivering production‑grade, commercially impactful data science solutions, gained in a data science or machine learning roles.
• Proven experience operating as a senior technical lead, reviewer, or technical sign‑off authority.
• Strong experience building ML solutions on cloud platforms (GCP, AWS, or Azure).
• Advanced expertise in Python and SQL.
• Deep applied knowledge of machine learning techniques, including regression, classification, clustering, and time‑series forecasting.
• Experience supporting production deployment and lifecycle management of ML models.
• Strong understanding of data warehousing, data modelling, and modern data architecture.
• Excellent communication skills, able to explain technical decisions clearly to non‑technical stakeholders.

Preferred Skills:

• Experience with recommender systems or personalisation use cases.
• Familiarity with MLOps concepts and production ML practices.
• Demonstrated ability to raise technical standards through influence rather than authority.
• Experience in an e‑commerce or retail environment.

CLOSING DATE: 14th August