Senior Data Scientist

Job Description

We are News UK Technology: Using technology to innovate and lead the global conversation on the future of media and storytelling. We keep people at heart of our business through values-driven and inclusive practices enabling our staff to grow and thrive. As such, we are proud members of Tech Talent Charter UK with 34% of our Tech roles filled by gender minorities. News UK Tech is an award-winning team winning Team of the Year at the UK Business and Innovation Awards,2023.

The Team: We are the Data Team at News UK. Our mission is to harness Data and AI to revolutionise how News UK delivers world-class journalism and entertainment, empowering editors, marketers, and advertisers to make informed, impactful decisions.

The Data team at News UK combines expertise in Data Science with a passion for innovation, operating in an environment that values clear direction and autonomous thinking. We're building curious, motivated teams who question everything and tackle exciting challenges with bold ideas and optimism.

To achieve our mission, we focus, among other things, on building novel AI solutions, from GenAI to classical ML, tapping into our rich datasets, to drive growth and increase revenue for our brands. Our users include the newsroom editors, marketing, advertising and product teams associated with our world-leading digital and print publications. From operations and infrastructure support to data technology and software development, we are committed to finding creative solutions to deliver essential news around the globe.

Our team works in an agile manner, with close collaboration in cross-functional teams of Data Scientists, MLEng, Data Engineers, BAs and Product. We are distributed across our London, Sofia and Bangalore offices.

Your Role: We are looking for a Senior Data Scientist who has strong analytical skills in the areas of Machine Learning and GenAI, the ability to work in an agile environment and sees the big picture while still paying attention to detail. Keeping up with the ever evolving world of technology takes someone who recognises the pace of change. You know what's happening across the data & AI landscape and you're ready to influence what's next.

Day to day you will:

GenAI Focus

• Research, prototype, and deploy solutions leveraging Generative AI technologies (e.g., LLMs, Agents, Embeddings) for applications such as content generation, audience segmentation, and insight enablement.
• Stay ahead of advancements in GenAI and champion their application to drive innovation in journalism and advertising.

AI Engineering Responsibilities

• Build end-to-end pipelines to deploy AI models into production, ensuring scalability, monitoring, and performance.
• Develop modular and reproducible code with production-grade quality, focusing on MLOps best practices.
• Collaborate with ML Engineers to optimise model deployment on distributed or cloud platforms like Google Cloud.

General Data Science Responsibilities

• Design and prototype robust machine learning models and statistical algorithms to address key business problems.
• Partner with stakeholders to deliver impactful solutions and evangelise insights through compelling storytelling.
• Ensure data integrity through validation, governance, and transparency.
• Create visualisations and dashboards to demonstrate the efficacy of solutions.

Collaboration & Development

• Work closely with interdisciplinary teams, including PMs, business owners, and operational teams, to align AI solutions with business needs.
• Continuously learn and experiment with new techniques, especially in Generative AI, to stay ahead in the field.
• Work closely with domain experts to evaluate efficacy of Ai solutions and ML models for further refinement.

What we're looking for from you:

• Minimum 3+ years of working experience as a hands-on data scientist is must; ideally in B2C digital products
• Advanced Degree in the field of Computer Science, Statistics, Mathematics, Data Science, an equivalent discipline or equivalent professional experience
• Strong programming experience with Python
• Great analytical and problem solving skills, with a strong bias for quality and engineering excellence
• Prior demonstrable experience with Machine Learning, GenAI and Experiment design.
• Experience with efficiently querying big datasets using SQL
• Experience or willingness to learn tools to create data pipelines using Airflow or similar solutions and an understanding of data processing best practices.
• Experience with data visualisation and dashboarding
• Able to recognise business needs and ability to communicate with multiple stakeholders including PMs, business owners and operational teams
• Able to work independently and collaboratively in an interdisciplinary team environment
• Experience working with Agile methodologies (SCRUM) and using Lean development principles
• Experience in working with Cloud Native patterns, ideally on GCP

If you think you have what it takes but don't tick every requirement on the list, please do apply. We recognise that considering someone's potential as well as their experience is a great way to hire. We want to hear from people who have a passion to learn and develop.

News UK is one of the leading media businesses in the UK and Ireland. Our newsbrands include The Times, The Sunday Times, The Sun, The Sun on Sunday and The TLS. Our national broadcast brands include talkSPORT, Times Radio and Virgin Radio UK, and we have market-leading local stations across Ireland. Our world-famous brands provide news, analysis, opinion and entertainment to almost 40 million people each month. Spanning print and pixel, audio and video, events and experiences, our multi-format brands are home to a plurality of opinion, representing the diverse communities we serve. Driven by passion, guided by principles and acting with purpose, we exist to promote a fair society, freedom of speech and a little bit of fun. Rethinking continually the business of storytelling, we represent, reflect and reach the nation, telling the stories that matter.

Life at News

Driven by passion, guided by principles and acting with purpose. We represent, reflect and reach the nation, telling the stories that matter. We inform our audiences so that they can make decisions based on trusted information.

We represent, reflect and reach the nation, telling the stories that matter most. To ensure these stories resonate with as broad an audience as possible, it is essential that our organisation reflects the diversity of the people we reach. Whether through age, gender, ethnicity, disability, social class or sexuality, we are committed to representing the rich variety of voices that make up our society. And we champion a culture where everyone has the opportunity to contribute and thrive as we continue to innovate and drive long term sustainable growth. This is done through our Diversity Strategy.

At News UK, we take pride in our exceptional employee-led networks that bring together individuals with shared interests and create a vibrant sense of community. We believe our networks play a vital role in fostering a collaborative and supportive work culture at News UK. Groups that we support include the African & Caribbean Network, Parents and Carers, and LGBTQ+ group News Is Out, and the Apprentice Society.

Benefits

Some of our benefits include:

• Maternity leave up to 18 weeks full basic salary & paternity leave up to 2 weeks
• Wide range of training available, plus full LinkedIn Learning access
• Private medical insurance including coverage for pre-existing conditions
• Discounted gym memberships , free ClassPass at Home, weekly virtual yoga classes
• 'Bikes for Work' and 'Electric Car' scheme
• Up to 60% discount on Harper Collins books
• Access to exclusive events and competitions with exciting brands such as talkSPORT, Virgin Radio UK & The Times. Weekly virtual panel chats with top journalists and celebrities
• Access to wellbeing benefits such as EAP, physio/massage and counselling
• A generous pension scheme with employer contributions of up to 5%
• 25 days holiday , plus bank holidays and up to 4 volunteering days per year

We want to ensure that everyone has the opportunity to perform to their best when applying for a role. If you would like to receive any information in a different way or for us to do anything differently to support you apply for any of our roles please contact us on [email protected].