Data Science Chapter Lead 1541 views

It is an exciting time to join Vistaprint as their founder, Robert Keane, recently stepped back in to lead Vistaprint as CEO and, is building out a new executive team. Together with all employees, they are renewing the company’s focus on delighting customers, fostering an entrepreneurial culture and accelerating our world-class capabilities.

They have a tremendous opportunity. Vistaprint’s vision of helping small business owners live their dreams is exciting and inspirational. In order to capitalize on their opportunity, they have embarked on a transformation journey to deliver “jaw-dropping customer value”. This transformation journey will lead them to achieve world-class technology, services, and innovation, and create an environment where their team members are inspired and enabled to do their best work.

Winning big in Data and Analytics is among their key priorities. Therefore, they recently hired a Chief Data Officer and are building the respective organization. The mission of this newly established team is to transform Vistaprint with industry-leading data products into one of the world’s most iconic Data and Analytics (DNA)-driven companies. They do this to

• Enable jaw-dropping, seamless, and fully personalized customer experience
• Fuel profitable growth with analytics capabilities across their entire value chain
• Attract and retain top-notch data science, analytics, and business-translator talent.

The newly established CDO organization will consist of cross-functional product teams that sit in 5 domains (pricing/promotion/personalization, channel platform/digital advertising, core business/customer modeling, manufacturing/supply chain, E2E customer experience). Next to the domains, there are chapters with specialized talent that works for the product teams. One of these chapters is Data Science, where they are recruiting for the chapter lead.

To enable top-notch data science and analytics capabilities, they have made major multi-year investments in a cloud-based, service-oriented and data-rich technology platform. The new platform has already launched in one country and will be rolled out across Europe during 2020, unlocking significant capability and hence, an opportunity for growth.

Position Summary

In support of this transformation, they are hiring for a newly created Data Science Chapter Lead position who will manage a team of data scientists responsible for the overarching goals of (i) developing best-in-class models and algorithms to create new data products and/or improve existing ones and (ii) establishing a data science community within Vistaprint, to foster exchange between various data capability chapters.

KEY RELATIONSHIPS

Reports to

Sebastian Klapdor, EVP and Chief Data Officer

(a member of the Vistaprint Executive Team)

Direct reports

All members of the Data Science chapter (currently ~10 people to be ramped up to 50 in the next 24 months).

Other Key Relationships

CDO Domain and Chapter Leads

Vistaprint Executive Team

Key Responsibilities

Directly reporting to the Chief Data Officer and as a member of the CDO leadership team, the Data Science Chapter Lead will take a core role in Vistaprint’s transformation towards a highly data-driven organization by leading a team of data scientists deploying best-in-class models and algorithms. Besides fostering exchange between the various data capability chapters by establishing a data science community within Vistaprint, the Data Science Chapter Lead is steering the development of both new data products and new methodologies applied to existing products. As the Data Science Chapter Lead, he/she will be responsible for:

• Shaping the initial growth of Data Science at Vistaprint through recruiting, staffing, training, and retention of the Data Science Chapter team
• Setting up a data science community within Vistaprint, allowing knowledge transfer between all data capability chapters
• Working closely with colleagues from other data capability chapters to facilitate data exploration and fast prototyping
• Building and leading a data science innovation lab for early-stage idea exploration and testing jointly with business stakeholders
• Developing complex models and algorithms that drive innovation throughout the organization, such as state-of-the-art dynamic pricing models
• Prototype to production:
  • Designing, developing and implementing product prototypes that are piloted and converted to products the use of which is institutionalized within the business
  • Working closely with the business to collect feedback, incorporating in the product, as well as maintaining and improving its functionality over time
• In conjunction with other stakeholders, establish an end to end Data Science technology platform to enable rapid prototyping, smooth delivery to production (including data processing), and agile improvement of models once in production
• Establishing a data science “brand” for Vistaprint in relevant Data Science communities

DESIRED OUTCOMES

• Acquisition and retention of ~50 data scientists over the next 24 months
• Adoption of leading data science practices incl. CICD, model lifecycle management, quality assurance
• Fostering a healthy Data Science culture driven by agile practices and business value

Ideal Experience

• MSc/Ph.D. in computer science, statistics, or operations research or related technical discipline (e.g. math, physics)

• Certifications in statistics, data mining and machine learning a plus
• 5+ years of experience in a management role with direct people leadership
• 10+ years of experience in a data science-related field (e.g., machine learning, optimization, statistics): an exceptional track record of developing analytical models in a wide range of situations and with varying levels of data architecture/availability
• Familiarity with latest Data Science, Analytics and Technology trends and their impact on business strategies and operations
• Deep knowledge in relevant application domains for e-commerce and manufacturing (e.g., personalization, attribution modeling, programmatic advertising)
• Strong understanding of statistics, structured and unstructured data analysis, predictive modeling techniques and good command of emerging methodologies like Artificial Intelligence
• Recognized thought leader and innovator in the development of new tools, methodologies, and problem-solving approaches
• Articulate, persuasive, communicator. Commands the room, handles executive and difficult audiences well. Skilled at defining, motivating and driving change at executive levels and across the broader community of stakeholders.

LEADERSHIP CAPABILITIES

• Driving Results: an excellent understanding of costs and benefits and an ability to use that understanding to prioritize activities.
• Customer Mindset: Ideally brings experience in serving and innovating on behalf of small business customers
• Driving Change: Highly trusted individual; excellent communication and interpersonal skills; experience with change management to help change mindsets and behaviors across the organization
• Building Capability: self-starter, hands-on entrepreneurial mindset; comfortable to take controlled risks and drive experimentation and learning; ability to scale and devise processes that support fast, decentralized decision making
• Leading People: Confident, engaging people leader, able to communicate a vision and bring people along on the journey