Principal Data Scientist - Candy Crush

Key Skills

Java Programming, Python Programming, SQL, Deep Learning, Looker, R Programming

Job Description

We are looking for a Principal Data Scientist, interested in pushing the boundaries of games analytics with a proven ability to apply your skills, be it technical, behavioural or economic, practically in order to generate business value. You will both act as a senior mentor as well as an individual contributor.

Your Role Within our Kingdom

You will be part of the In- app- purchases & Economy team in Candy Crush Saga, working closely with varied stakeholders in a fun, dynamic and fast- paced environment. You’ll possess the role of a subject matter expert in the data science area while helping us to further understand, model, predict and segment our players. While working closely with data scientists in the team, you will make sure and educate others on using up to date algorithms and technology.
 

Specifically, you’ll:

• Identifying potential business opportunities, translating business needs to technical requirements, analysing A/B tests and scoping and building machine learning models and solutions where appropriate
• Mentoring other data scientists, conducting code review and facilitating pair programming sessions.
• Communicating results to both technical and non- technical colleagues by generating dashboards, reports and presentations.
• Providing an analytics perspective to discussions and prioritisation within the team.
• Being the pro- active owner of the entire data chain for your project(s)

Skills to Create Thrills

Our ideal candidate will have solid experience leading an analytical team in a commercial environment. There is plenty of scope at King for you to learn from your colleagues in the areas where you have less experience, and to share your own skills where you are stronger.

Specific factors that are helpful to excel in this role include:

• Leadership: The ability to mentor, guide and inspire your colleagues and drive best practices across the company
• Stakeholder Management: The ability to recognise dependencies, build relationships and influence others
• Business Insight: The ability to understand the problems and issues our games and business wants to solve, and then defining the right data, analysis or interpretation to lead to the right recommendations and decisions
• Communication: Designing good ways of communicating, visualising or reporting your results/analysis so they are clear and unambiguous
• SQL: The ability to write complex SQL queries to analyse our databases with 300+ million players and work with relational database systems.
• Analytical coding: Using tools such as R, Python or Excel for analytical purpose and model building
• Stats: Understanding the basics of appropriate statistical and/or machine learning techniques.

Minimum requirements:

• General machine learning expertise, i.e. regression, classification, and clustering algorithms, time- series analysis, Bayesian methods, deep learning.
• A passion for analytics and diving into as well as experiencing the products on which you work (video game enthusiasm with a solid understanding of the connection of gameplay to spending behavior is a plus)
• Solid understanding of statistics, e.g. statistical power analysis, significance testing, t- tests, ANOVA …
• Designing good ways of communicating, visualising or reporting your results/analysis so they are clear and unambiguous, good stakeholder management skills.