Manager, Data Science

Expel

23h•Remote

About The Position

At Expel, you'll lead a data science team doing R&D that shapes how we use machine learning, generative AI, and LLMs to protect our customers and make our humans better at their jobs. You'll work at the intersection of cutting-edge AI and real-world security operations, with access to unique data sets and a team that genuinely cares about doing it right. You're comfortable talking technical depth with researchers and translating tradeoffs for product and business stakeholders. You coach people on their careers as naturally as you debate model architectures. You set clear expectations, remove blockers, and let your team do their best work — and you see enabling your team as the core of the role.

Requirements

Proven track record leading and managing data science teams (4+ years), with strong coaching and mentoring skills
Ability to build trust quickly and sustain strong relationships with PM, Customer Success, and engineering peers
Excellent project management, problem solving, and multitasking skills across remote/hybrid teams
You align with our Engineering Principles
Strong hands-on experience designing, deploying, and scaling ML solutions in AWS and/or GCP
Extensive Python experience, including transitioning exploratory models from Jupyter into production-ready code
Proficiency in Python data science frameworks (e.g., TensorFlow, PyTorch, Pandas, Scikit-Learn); expert-level depth in at least one area
Hands-on experience with generative AI and LLM frameworks such as LangChain, LlamaIndex, or the OpenAI/Anthropic SDKs
Experience with RAG pipelines, prompt engineering, and LLM evaluation
Familiarity with MLOps platforms (Vertex AI, SageMaker, or MLflow) and vector databases (Pinecone, Weaviate, pgvector)
Experience building or overseeing agentic AI workflows and multi-agent orchestration, ideally within AWS using Amazon Bedrock and AgentCore
Solid software engineering practices: Git, CI/CD, code review, testable code
Educational background in AI, machine learning, statistics, and/or graph theory; Bachelor's degree in Math or Computer Science preferred or a compelling story
6+ years of professional data science experience, including 4+ years in a team leadership role

Responsibilities

Lead the data science team to work on small-to-medium scale, high-impact R&D projects — iterating fast, communicating status clearly, and coordinating delivery with stakeholders
Coach and develop your team through regular 1:1s, performance reviews, and career conversations; recruit and onboard new members with an eye toward team dynamics
Foster a culture of responsible AI, innovation, and technical excellence
Work closely with PM, UX, D&R, Security, and Engineering to contribute to product strategy, set delivery expectations, and engage in collaborative discussion about tradeoffs
Collaborate with peer teams to define Expel's generative AI and LLM strategy — identifying opportunities to leverage foundation models, new architectures, and agentic workflows
Engage in resource planning, technical decision making, and budget management in service of the product and technical roadmaps
Define clear, measurable milestones for research initiatives; monitor progress with data-driven metrics; communicate regularly with senior leadership
Contribute to and maintain responsible AI practices including model fairness, explainability, safety guardrails, and bias monitoring for production ML and LLM systems
Contribute to non-critical-path feature implementation, bug fixing, and technical design (no more than 25% of your time)
Partner with Marketing to develop blogs, papers, and talks on how Expel thinks about, applies, measures, and validates the use of ML, generative AI, and LLMs
Present internally and externally to both technical and non-technical audiences