Applied scientist I

Key Skills

Apache Airflow, AWS, Azure, Deep Learning, Effective communication skills, Google Cloud Platform (GCP), Machine learning techniques, TensorFlow

Job Description

What’s the role?

We are looking for an experienced Applied Machine Learning Scientist to join the Recommendations Ranking team in order to help enable product teams across Etsy to understand, personalize, and rank recommendations that we show to buyers.

The Recommendations Ranking team builds machine learning models that aim to enhance personalization and optimize recommendation relevance, thereby improving the overall user experience. We use machine learning algorithms to train models that optimize for different objective functions, tailored to meet different business needs. 

As an Applied Scientist, you will work closely with Software Engineers and product managers to build custom ranking models for recommendation systems. We are looking for individuals who are product & technology driven, and are passionate about making ML innovations in areas such as: Ranking, Optimization, Deep Learning, and Reinforcement Learning to help improve the Etsy buyer/seller search experience!

This is a full-time position reporting to the Sr. Manager, Data Science and the base salary range will be 164,000 - 192,000 USD per year. In addition to salary, you will also be eligible for an equity package, an annual performance bonus, and ourcompetitive benefits that support you and your family as part of your total rewards package at Etsy. For this role, we are considering candidates based in the U.S. who are either remote, flex, or office-based. Etsy offers different work modes to meet the variety of needs and preferences of our team. Learn more about our Flex and Office-based work modes and workplace safety policieshere.

What does the day-to-day look like?

• Initiate and lead new tracks of work to enhance ranking capabilities of Etsy’s Recommendation engine.
• Develop innovative ML ranking models that optimize for various business goals to power recommendations at scale.
• Build models that allow us to better understand the unique interests, tastes, and shopping mission of Etsy’s buyers.
• Develop models with custom architectures or objective functions that target Etsy-specific problems, including but not limited to revenue optimization, seller fairness, and seasonality.
• Work closely with software engineers, data scientists, applied scientists, product managers, and designers.
• Of course, this is just a sample of the kinds of work this role will require! You should assume that

  your role will encompass other tasks, too, and that your job duties and responsibilities may

  change from time to time at Etsy's discretion, or otherwise applicable with local law.

Qualities that will help you thrive in this role are:

• Successful track record of applying machine learning techniques to address real-world problems.
• Experience with / working in one of the following fields: deep learning, uplift modeling, fairness in recommender systems, reinforcement learning. 
• Shown success developing productionized machine learning systems. You are comfortable with using git, docker, and other tools for writing robust, production-ready code.
• Ability to write code and manipulate data at a large scale, in distributed environments.
• Ability to take on and lead unconstrained problems and know when to seek help and how to deliver.
• Strong verbal and written communication skills.

Preferred requirements:

• A Ph.D. degree in Computer Science or related engineering fields with 1+ years of practical machine learning experience or an M.S. degree in Computer Science or related engineering field with 3+ years of practical machine learning experience.
• Experience in Deep Learning.
• Experience using Scala Spark, Airflow, and Tensorflow.
• Experience using Google Cloud Platform tools (GCP).
• Experience in building production recommendations, search, or advertising systems.

Additional Information

What's Next

If you're interested in joining the team at Etsy, please share your resume with us and feel free to include a cover letter if you'd like. As we hope you've seen already, Etsy is a place that values individuality and variety. We don't want you to be like everyone else -- we want you to be like you! So tell us what you're all about.