Principal Data Scientist

Position: Principal Data Scientist 

Reporting to: Head of Data Science 

Location: London 

Type: Permanent 

Band: 3 

As a Principal Data Scientist, you will play a pivotal role as a critical thinker for Hiscox. You will utilize your technical skills and innovative mindset to tackle complex business problems and identify opportunities for growth. Your ability to navigate various business functions and manage multiple priorities will be essential in supporting evidence-based decision making. Additionally, you will provide ad hoc analysis and develop predictive and prescriptive models to foster a data-driven culture within Hiscox. Operating in a fast-paced and dynamic environment, you will communicate the business value derived from analytical solutions to key stakeholders. 

The role

This role will primarily be working as part of a newly created innovation lab whose efforts span multiple business functions. The aim of this lab is to rapidly prototype solutions with a strong commercial impact. As a senior member of the innovation lab team, you will be helping to run individual projects and helping ensure that we develop in a standard way enabling a fast go to market.

Key Responsibilities: 

• Utilize industry standards, emerging methodologies, and empirical research to develop critical business inputs and assist leaders in innovating their approaches. 

• Manage end-to-end data solutions, including understanding complex business challenges, designing scientific solutions, working with diverse data sets (both internal and external), and employing advanced machine learning or statistical modelling techniques to derive insights.   

• Lead and mentor junior data scientists and other technical personnel. 

• Engage closely with other members of the data and analytics community at Hiscox to deliver value through various analytics techniques. 

• Determine methods for monitoring the commercial impact of the work of the innovation lab.  
   

Person Specification: 

• Degree in a STEM or closely related field. 

• Strong experience working in data science including working with cross functional teams. 

• Comfortable presenting to a wide range of technical and non-technical stakeholders. 

• Background in data science within finance, insurance, or Ecommerce is advantageous but not required. 

• Ability to conduct high-quality research independently and within small teams. 

• Familiarity with IT delivery methods, tools and best practice is necessary. 

• A further degree is an advantage. 
   

Skills: 

• Expertise in developing predictive and prescriptive analyses (predictive modelling, machine learning, or data mining) to extract key business insights and clearly convey findings to target audiences. 

• Proficiency in analytical tools, programming languages, and databases (e.g., R, Python, SQL). 

• Demonstrable competency in a wide range of machine learning techniques, from simple linear models and random forests to deep learning and generative AI. 

• Strong interest in natural language processing or machine vision. 

• Solid understanding of foundational statistics. 

• Experience collaborating within small teams and independently on analytics projects. 

• Excellent verbal and written communication skills, along with effective presentation abilities, are vital due to significant exposure to various internal stakeholders. 

• Knowledge of insurance is beneficial but not essential. 
   

Impact and Achievements: 

• Drive innovation, growth and commercial value through data, machine learning and AI-driven insights and solutions. 

• Achieve measurable improvements in key business.  

• Contribute to the development of industry-leading AI, data and analytics techniques and methodologies. 

Apply now for further information. 

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