Lead Data Scientist - Recommendations (Applied ML, Deep Learning, Relevance Systems)

Key Skills

Apache Hadoop, Apache Hive, Deep Learning, Effective communication skills, Java Programming, Python Programming, R Programming, SPARK Programming, SQL

Job Description

The pay range is $126,600.00 - $227,900.00

Pay is based on several factors which vary based on position. These include labor markets and in some instances may include education, work experience and certifications. In addition to your pay, Target cares about and invests in you as a team member, so that you can take care of yourself and your family. Target offers eligible team members and their dependents comprehensive health benefits and programs, which may include medical, vision, dental, life insurance and more, to help you and your family take care of your whole selves. Other benefits for eligible team members include 401(k), employee discount, short term disability, long term disability, paid sick leave, paid national holidays, and paid vacation. Find competitive benefits from financial and education to well-being and beyond at https://corporate.target.com/careers/benefits.

JOIN TARGET AS A LEAD DATA SCIENTIST – RECOMMENDATIONS

About Us:

As a Fortune 50 company with more than 350,000 team members worldwide, Target is an iconic brand and one of America's leading retailers.

Working at Target means the opportunity to help all families discover the joy of everyday life. Caring for our communities is woven into who we are, and we invest in the places we collectively live, work and play. We prioritize relationships, develop talent by creating growth opportunities and succeed as one Target team. At our core, our purpose is ingrained in who we are, what we value and how we work. It’s how we care, grow, and win together. Every time a guest enters a Target store or browses Target.com, they experience the impact of Target’s investments in technology and innovation. We’re the technologists behind one of the most loved retail brands, delivering joy to millions of our guests, team members, and communities.

Join our global in-house Tech team of more than 5,000 software engineers, applied data scientists, architects and product managers striving to make Target the most convenient, safe and joyful place to shop. We use agile practices and leverage open-source software to adapt and build best-in-class technology for our team members and guests. We do so with a focus on diversity and inclusion, experimentation and continuous learning.

A role with Target Data Sciences means the chance to help develop and manage state of the art predictive algorithms that use data at scale to automate and optimize decisions at scale. Whether you join our Statistics, Optimization or Advanced Machine Learning teams, you’ll be challenged to harness Target’s impressive data breadth to build the algorithms that power solutions our partners in Marketing, Supply Chain Optimization and Personalization rely on.    Every Scientist on Target’s Data Sciences team can expect modeling and data science, software/product development of highly performant code for Model Performance and to elevate Target’s culture and apply retail domain knowledge.

As a Lead Data Scientist, you’ll influence by interacting with the Data Sciences team, Product teams, Scientist/Engineer individual contributors from other pillars, and business partners. You will perform within the scale and scope of your role by defining solutions and beginning to identify problems to solve and contribute to Data Sciences’ and Target’s culture by modeling and contributing to the culture. You’ll get the opportunity to use your expertise in one or more of the following areas: machine learning, probability theory & statistics, optimization theory, Simulation, Econometrics, Deep Learning, Natural Language processing or computer vision. We will look to you to own design and implementation of an algorithmic solution (e.g., recommendation or forecasting algorithm), including data understanding, feature engineering, model development, validation and testing, and deployment to a production environment. You’ll drive development of problem statements that capture the business considerations, define metrics/measurement to validate model performance, and drive feasibility study with data requirements and potential solutions approaches to be considered. You’ll evaluate tradeoffs of simple vs complex models/solutions in determining the right technique to employ for a business problem and develop and maintain a nuanced understanding of the data generated by the business, including fundamental limitations of the data. You’ll leverage your proficiency in one or more approved programming languages (Java, Scala, Python, R), and ensure foundational programming principles in developing code (best practices, writes unit tests, code organization, basics of CI/CD etc.) are followed in developing the team’s products/models.

You’ll not only stitch together basic data pipelines for a given problem and own design and implementation of individual components within Data Science/Tech applications, but also articulate the technical strategy, value of technology, and impact on the business. As you do so, you’ll collaborate with engineers, scientists, and business partners/product owners to create algorithmic solutions that are performant and integrated into applications. We’ll look to you to mentor and provide technical support within a team, including mentoring junior team members, and present your work and your team’s work to business partners and other Data Sciences teams. With a deeper understanding of your functional area of responsibility, you’ll support agile ceremonies, collaborate with peers across multiple products, communicate and collaborate with business partners, and demonstrate an understanding of areas outside your scope of responsibility. The exciting part of retail It’s always changing!

Core responsibilities of this job are described within this job description. Job duties may change at any time due to business needs.

About you:

• 4-year degree in Quantitative disciplines (Science, Tech, Engineering, Mathematics) and 6+ years of professional experience or equivalent industry experience
• MS in Quantitative disciplines (Science, Tech, Engineering, Mathematics)
• Knowledge and experience developing optimization, simulation and statistical models
• Strong analytical thinking skills. Ability to creatively solve business problems, innovating new approaches where required
• Strong hands-on programming skills in Python, SQL, Hadoop/Hive. Additional knowledge of Spark, Scala, R, Java desired but not mandatory
• Good working knowledge of mathematical and statistical concepts, MILP, algorithms, and computational complexity
• Experience solving relevant real-world problems using a data science approach
• Experience in implementing advanced statistical techniques like regression, clustering, PCA, forecasting (time series), etc.
• Able to create reasonable documents/narrative suggesting actionable insights
• Excellent communication skills. Ability to clearly tell data driven stories through appropriate visualizations, graphs and narratives
• Self-driven and results oriented; able to meet tight timelines
• Strong team player with ability to collaborate effectively across geographies/time zones

Preferred:

• PhD in Computer Science, Applied Mathematics, Statistics, Physics or related quantitative field
• Proven record of achieving significant engineering (applied ML) or academic research in Recommender Systems, Information Relevance Systems or Gen AI

This position will operate as a Hybrid/Flex for Your Day work arrangement based on Target’s needs. A Hybrid/Flex for Your Day work arrangement means the team member’s core role will need to be performedboth onsite at the Target HQ MN location the role is assigned to and virtually, depending upon what your role, team and tasks require for that day. Work duties cannot be performed outside of the country of the primary work location, unless otherwise prescribed by Target. Click here if you are curious to learn more about Minnesota.

Americans with Disabilities Act (ADA)

Target will provide reasonable accommodations with the application process upon your request as required to comply with applicable laws. If you have a disability and require assistance in this application process, please visit your nearest Target store or Supply Chain Facility or reach out to Guest Services at 1-800-440-0680 for additional information.