Senior Data Scientist

At Smart, our mission is to transform retirement, savings and financial wellbeing, across all generations, around the world.

The role

We are seeking an experienced hands-on Senior Data Scientist with a strong background in Python programming and advanced mathematical skills to lead our data science team. As a Senior Data Scientist, you will be instrumental in driving our data-driven culture across the organisation and collaborating with the Head of Data Science and Analytics to deliver innovative solutions that leverage the power of data.

Main responsibilities:

• Lead and mentor the data science team, providing technical guidance and fostering a collaborative and innovative environment.
• Develop and implement cutting-edge machine learning algorithms and models to extract valuable insights from complex datasets.
• Utilise your extensive experience with Python to design and implement efficient and scalable data processing pipelines.
• Oversee the end-to-end development and deployment of machine learning models, ensuring seamless integration into production environments.
• Champion the adoption of MLops practices to automate and streamline model deployment, monitoring, and maintenance.
• Collaborate with cross-functional teams to understand business requirements, formulate data-driven solutions, and present findings to stakeholders.
• Stay up-to-date with the latest advancements in data science, machine learning, and cloud technologies, particularly AWS services.
• Promote a strong data culture throughout the organisation, advocating for data-driven decision-making at all levels.
• Monitor the performance of Junior Data Scientists and provide them with practical guidance, as needed.
• Select and employ advanced statistical procedures to obtain actionable insights.
• Cross-validate models to ensure their generalisability.
• Produce and disseminate non-technical reports that detail the successes and limitations of each project.
• Suggest ways in which insights obtained might be used to inform business strategies.
• Stay informed about developments in Data Science and adjacent fields to ensure that outputs are always relevant.

Requirements

The skills, experience and aptitudes we are looking for are listed below. If it all sounds like you, we’d love to hear from you.

Please don’t be discouraged from applying if you don’t meet every single one of these criteria – having a ‘can do’ attitude is sometimes more important than being able to tick every box:

• Bachelor's or Master's degree in Computer Science, Mathematics, Statistics, or a related field.
• Extensive experience (minimum 5 years) as a Data Scientist, working on complex projects and delivering actionable insights.
• Proficiency in Python for data manipulation, model development, and deployment
• Strong mathematical skills with a solid understanding of statistical methods and machine learning algorithms.
• Proven leadership skills, with experience leading and mentoring data science teams.
• Demonstrated experience with AWS services, utilising cloud resources for data storage, processing, and analysis.
• In-depth knowledge of MLflow to track and manage machine learning experiments effectively.
• Extensive experience in MLops practices, automating the end-to-end ML lifecycle for efficient and reliable model deployment.
• Excellent communication and presentation skills, with the ability to convey complex technical concepts to non-technical stakeholders.
• Strong problem-solving skills, an analytical mindset, and a passion for discovering insights through data exploration.

Who we are

We work in partnerships with governments and financial institutions in the UK and internationally. Our cloud-native digital platform is revolutionising how people around the world think about, and save for, their retirement.

At heart, we’re a financial technology business. What we do is all about innovation, and using the power of digital change to put the customer first. Our Engineers will tell you that working at Smart gives you the opportunity to play your part in developing world-class technological solutions, working with – and learning from – like-minded people.

You’ll also find that, across our business, our colleagues love Smart’s culture, and how what we do means better financial outcomes for savers. That feels worthwhile, and it means that what we do, collectively, goes way beyond the nine to five of a typical working day.

Don’t just take our word for it – you can see what our colleagues say about working at Smart on the Great Place To Work website, LinkedIn Life and Glassdoor.

Benefits

At Smart, one of the eight principles we work to is “We want happy and good people in our team”. We created a list of benefits that helps us achieve this goal:

• 25 days’ holiday per year, increasing with length of service.
• £500 annual training budget to spend on your professional development
• Extensive private healthcare, including dental, eyecare and EAP
• Enhanced sick leave (three months’ pay per year)
• Enhanced maternity and paternity (maternity – 6 months fully paid/paternity – 3 weeks fully paid)
• Death in service insurance cover
• Fully-paid five-week sabbatical after five years of employment
• In office wellbeing, such as manicures, massages and barbers. We also serve free lunch, breakfasts and social drinks weekly.
• Smart employees also enjoy a 50% discount on orders from our sister company Arena Flowers, Britain's most ethical florist. They offer unique hand-tied bouquets, luxury flowers, letterbox flowers, plants and gifts to spend on friends and loved ones or even for yourself.

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We think Smart is an awesome place to work. If it sounds like somewhere you’d like to work too, and if you’re ready to play your part in our continued success in the future, then naturally we’d love to meet you.