Senior Director, Applied Science

About the role

This role drives the strategic direction of machine learning (ML) and artificial intelligence (AI) initiatives, aligning with cross-functional leaders and executives to address critical business and product needs. The position involves leading end-to-end applied research, from surveying state-of-the-art technologies to designing, training, and optimizing ML/AI models and solution architectures. The role also includes forecasting resource needs, securing resources, and engaging with the research community through publications, presentations, and keynote speaking opportunities.

Responsibilities

• Solution Identification
  • Align with cross-functional leaders and executives to identify and address strategic business and product needs using ML/AI.
  • Set quality standards and ensure execution of end-to-end science strategies to address multiple product and business challenges.
  • Drive the design and implementation of research and development strategies for innovative products and services.
• Solution Development – Applied Research
  • Design and implement standards for developing and piloting research proofs-of-concept (POCs) or experiments to demonstrate feasibility and secure support for applied research.
  • Establish group-wide standards for dataset selection and preparation, ensuring high-quality, comprehensive datasets are used.
  • Drive research strategies to identify new theories, tools, and methodologies for transferring state-of-the-art technologies into products or advancing the field.
• Solution Development – ML/AI Technologies
  • Define and refine group-wide standards for designing, developing, and optimizing ML/AI technologies, including model training, fine-tuning, and computation optimizations.
  • Promote best practices for ML/AI solution architecture, including data, model, training, and evaluation.
• Solution Development – Articulating Research Insights
  • Drive best practices for identifying meaningful insights from data and metadata sources through analysis and experiments.
  • Advise on the interpretation and communication of insights and findings across the organization.
  • Lead the creation of patents, white papers, or other technical documentation related to applied research outcomes.
• Solution Delivery – Coding and Documentation
  • Develop group processes for writing efficient, bug-free code from scratch and maintaining existing codebases.
  • Establish best practices for version control, code review, and code delivery/deployment.
  • Review and refine professional documentation for technical processes, including experimentation, data collection, and model building.
  • Advocate for tools to improve productivity.
• Solution Delivery – Resource and Partnership Management
  • Forecast and negotiate resource needs to enable operations support and ensure successful delivery of solutions.
  • Leverage strategic partnerships to remove barriers to timely delivery and integration of services.
  • Form cross-functional partnerships to facilitate deployment of solutions into production environments.
• Building Research Capability – Research Excellence
  • Promote a culture of excellence in applied research technology areas across the group.
  • Build domain expertise and drive best practices in applied research.
• Building Research Capability – Research Community Presence
  • Lead the publication, presentation, and internal/external review of high-impact research findings in top-tier conferences and industry outlets.
  • Serve as a keynote speaker at conferences or panels.
  • Establish collaborations with internal and external research labs.
• Planning & Execution
  • Provide strategic oversight for large-scale projects, monitoring timelines, deliverables, and budgets.
  • Set strategies for delegating work, prioritizing tasks, and aligning projects with business needs.
  • Drive strategic planning across teams, providing guidance on resources and timelines.
• Collaboration & Partnership
  • Set strategic direction for cross-functional collaboration to ensure alignment of expectations and objectives.
  • Foster a culture of teamwork and empower teams to build partnerships with business leaders, stakeholders, and customers.
  • Promote transparency and inclusivity, valuing all voices.
• Problem Solving
  • Develop and implement strategies for advanced problem-solving across the organization, serving as an escalation point for complex issues.
  • Oversee teams using innovative techniques to address ambiguous issues, identify root causes, and prevent recurrence.
• Continuous Learning
  • Champion continuous learning to maintain cutting-edge skills and influence organizational best practices.
  • Inspire teams to build and maintain expertise by monitoring emerging trends, technologies, and industry standards.
  • Contribute to the organization’s learning and development strategy.
• Continuous Improvement
  • Drive a culture of continuous improvement, setting standards for efficient processes, protocols, and workflows.
  • Oversee large-scale improvement initiatives, ensuring alignment with organizational goals.
  • Set strategic direction, prioritize, and approve improvement initiatives to maximize ROI.
• Performance and Development
  • Ensure consistent application of performance management strategies, systems, and processes.
  • Foster a culture of career development, encouraging teams to pursue growth opportunities.
  • Drive consistency in talent development procedures and socialize performance expectations.
  • Partner with HR and executive leadership to execute a talent management strategy.

Requirements

• Minimum Qualifications
  • 12 years of experience in data science, machine learning, artificial intelligence, natural language processing, speech recognition, statistical modeling, data mining, or a related field.
  • OR a Bachelor’s degree in Mathematics, Statistics, Computer Science, Data Science, Physics, or a related field and 8 years of relevant experience.
  • OR a Master’s degree in the above fields and 6 years of relevant experience.
  • OR a Doctorate in the above fields and 4 years of relevant experience.
  • 5 years of experience in an applicable programming language.
• Preferred Qualifications
  • 14 years of relevant experience.
  • OR a Bachelor’s degree and 10 years of relevant experience.
  • OR a Master’s degree and 8 years of relevant experience.
  • OR a Doctorate and 6 years of relevant experience.
  • 7 years of experience in a leadership role with direct reports.
  • 4 years of experience working with operating budgets and/or project financials.
  • 7 years of experience creating publications (e.g., white papers, peer-reviewed conference or journal articles).