Role overview
The BBC has been serving audiences online for decades. Across our flagship products – BBC iPlayer, Sounds, News, Sport, and more – we educate, inform, and entertain millions of people every single day.
We are now accelerating our shift towards experiences that are shaped around our audiences: more personal, more relevant, and more responsive to their needs.
At the heart of this transformation is the Recommendations team. We design and build large scale ML/AI systems that help audiences discover the right content at the right moment. Our work already powers experiences across the BBC, including personalised recommendations on iPlayer and BBC Sounds. We’re now looking for a Principal Data Scientist to help us in this next stage of our journey.
What you'll work on
- You’ll use your technical skills to deliver value to BBC audiences, blending a breadth and depth of data science expertise.
- You’ll have impact within your immediate team and beyond, across the wider BBC, instrumental in developing scalable ML products.
- You’ll work effectively within a cross-functional environment, collaborating to overcome the real-world challenges of deploying and maintaining ML in production.
- You’ll apply your knowledge of machine learning algorithms to solve complex user and business problems in a robust and scalable way.
- You’ll join the wider BBC Data Science community, with internal and external opportunities to get involved, share your knowledge, and mentoring colleagues.
*YOUR SKILLS AND EXPERIENCE
Essential:**
- Extensive hands-on experience in data science and machine learning, with a proven track record of contributing to technical machine learning projects.
- Experience developing and deploying recommender systems.
- Strong coding skills in Python.
- Ability to clearly communicate to both technical and non-technical audiences.
- Ability to work effectively in a cross-functional team.
Interview process
There is a 2-stage process:
- Hiring manager introductory call covering role background and candidate motivations for applying (external applicants only).
- 1.5 hour panel interview including a technical presentation from the candidate and role relevant competency-based questions.
Freelancers are eligible to apply for an internal role if they are on a Worker Contract (more info here) and they have worked continuously for 6 months. If they have worked for less than 6 months continuously or have a break of 3 weeks or more between engagements, they must seek Divisional HR approval to apply for an internal role prior to submitting an application.
Disclaimer
This job description is a written statement of the essential characteristics of the job, with its principal accountabilities, incorporating a note of the skills, knowledge and experience required for a satisfactory level of performance. This is not intended to be a complete, detailed account of all aspects of the duties involved.
Please note: If you were to be offered this role, the BBC will conduct Employment screening checks which include Reference checks; Eligibility to work checks; and if applicable to the role, Safeguarding and Adverse media/Social media checks. Any offer made is conditional on these checks being satisfactory.
For any general queries, please contact: [email protected]
Redeployment
The BBC is committed to redeploying employees seeking suitable alternative employment within the BBC and they will be given priority consideration ahead of other applicants. Priority consideration means for those employees seeking redeployment their application will be considered alongside anyone else at risk of redundancy, prior to any individuals being considered who are not at risk.