Director, Data Science

Heidrick & Struggles•Chicago, IL

10h•$145,000 - $180,000

About The Position

Heidrick & Struggles (Nasdaq: HSII) is a premier provider of global leadership advisory and on-demand talent solutions, serving the senior-level talent and consulting needs of the world's top organizations. In our role as trusted leadership advisors, we partner with our clients to develop future-ready leaders and organizations, bringing together our services and offerings in executive search, diversity and inclusion, leadership assessment and development, organization and team acceleration, culture shaping and on-demand, independent talent solutions. Heidrick & Struggles pioneered the profession of executive search more than 70 years ago. Today, the firm provides integrated talent and human capital solutions to help our clients change the world, one leadership team at a time.® Additional information on the firm can be found at www.heidrick.com . Heidrick & Struggles is building the future of talent advisory through data science and AI. As Director Data Scientist within HLabs (our internal R&D group), you'll be a hands-on technical leader who explores the frontier of innovation & translates ideas into production systems to transform how we serve clients. This is a builder's role. You’ll spend most of your time in the code architecting, building, and deploying elegant solutions across traditional AI/ML models, cutting-edge LLM agents, and generative AI applications. As a technical leader, you'll set the vision for AI/ML projects while partnering across IT, Product, Engineering, and HLabs teams. Your expertise will guide project direction, elevate team members through hands-on mentorship, and bridge the gap between ambitious business objectives and successful technical execution. If you thrive on building new capabilities to solve challenging problems, working across the full stack from experimentation to production, and seeing your work drive real business outcomes, this role is for you.

Requirements

8+ years of hands-on experience in data science, AI, and machine learning with a strong track record of shipping production systems that drove measurable business impact
Deep expertise in Python and modern ML/AI tooling (Sagemaker, PyTorch/TensorFlow, HuggingFace, LangChain, etc.)
Demonstrated experience building LLM-based applications across generative AI tools, agents, RAG systems, or other applied LLM solutions
Experience leading technical projects and mentoring others within data science/analytics
Proven track record of designing, building and managing production data/AI systems
Advanced degree in a quantitative field (statistics, computer science, data science, etc.) or equivalent practical experience
Strong collaboration skills: You can work directly with business partners, understand their needs, and deliver solutions they will actually use
SQL and data platform experience (Snowflake strongly preferred) with the ability to work across the data stack
Experience using Git/Github to manage, version and deploy projects

Nice To Haves

Experience applying ML/AI within social sciences, talent analytics, or people-focused domains
Track record of rapid prototyping and iteration in ambiguous problem spaces
Experience with MLOps, model deployment, and monitoring in production environments

Responsibilities

Lead the development of data-driven tools and capabilities that create efficiencies and new revenue streams across the Heidrick business lines.
Serve as an AI/ML Technical leader and mentor to staff data scientists through code reviews, technical guidance, and knowledge sharing
Build production AI/ML systems that create measurable business value through operational efficiencies, enhanced capabilities, or new revenue streams
Lead end-to-end development of generative AI solutions, agents, and LLM-based applications, from prototype to scaled deployment
Drive technical innovation by identifying where emerging technologies (LLMs, RAG systems, agentic workflows, etc.) can unlock new possibilities for the business
Partner with business leaders to translate strategic needs into technical solutions, balancing ambition with pragmatism
Communicate impact by making complex technical work accessible to non-technical stakeholders