Principal Applied Data Scientist - Search and Browse (NLP, Vector Search, LLMs)

Target • Sunnyvale, CA

8d • Hybrid

About The Position

The Applied Data Sciences team at Target focuses on developing and managing state-of-the-art predictive algorithms that leverage data at scale to automate and optimize decisions. This role is within the Search and Browse Applied Data Science team, which builds foundational relevance, retrieval, ranking, and personalized search systems for Target's digital experience. The team is defining the future of AI-native commerce discovery across Search, Browse, and conversational shopping. They are tackling complex problems in retail AI at a large commercial scale, including architecting search and data systems for external LLM ingestion, building zero-shot and cold-start discovery systems for dynamic inventory, solving natural language and long-tail search problems, and evolving multi-stage retrieval and ranking architectures. The role requires technical leadership, product judgment, and the ability to influence organizational strategy to drive customer and business impact. Engineering excellence, low latency, reliability, and cost-efficiency are as important as modeling sophistication.

Requirements

• PhD or MS in Computer Science, Statistics, Applied Mathematics, Physics or related quantitative discipline
• 8+ years of industry experience building and scaling ML systems for Search, Recommendation, Personalization, Ads, or AI platforms
• Strong experience with semantic retrieval, vector search, RAG systems, conversational search or agentic AI systems
• Deep expertise in retrieval/ranking architectures, recommendation systems, semantic search, NLP/LLMs, experimentation and ML infrastructure (VertexAI)
• Demonstrated Python programming and technical ML problem-solving skills
• Proven experience defining architecture and long-term strategy for large-scale production AI systems
• Experience operating large-scale online systems with strict latency, scalability, reliability, and infrastructure cost requirements
• Strong understanding of retrieval/ranking system tradeoffs, experimentation strategy, and operational excellence
• Strong track record driving measurable business impact through ML innovation
• Experience leading cross-functional initiatives spanning multiple teams or organizations
• Ability to influence executive stakeholders and drive organizational technical direction
• Exceptional communication, technical leadership, strategic thinking, and mentoring skills

Responsibilities

• Define the long-term technical vision and organizational roadmap for Search, Browse, and AI-driven discovery systems.
• Lead architecture strategy for large-scale retrieval, ranking, semantic search, and GenAI systems.
• Drive innovation across transformers, LLMs, RAG architectures, multi-stage ranking systems, personalization, conversational commerce, and agentic AI.
• Architect search and retrieval systems for external LLM and agentic search ecosystem integration.
• Define the future evolution of semantic retrieval, conversational search, and zero-shot discovery systems.
• Influence organization-wide strategy across relevance, experimentation, evaluation, ML infrastructure, and AI product investments.
• Lead highly ambiguous, multi-quarter initiatives involving Product, Engineering, Applied Science, Infrastructure, and executive stakeholders.
• Establish scalable ML architecture patterns, experimentation standards, and operational best practices across multiple teams.
• Drive foundational investments and technical direction across Search, Retrieval Infrastructure, and AI-powered discovery platforms.
• Balance customer experience, business impact, system reliability, latency, scalability, and infrastructure cost at enterprise scale.
• Mentor Lead scientists and technical leaders across the organization.
• Represent the organization in executive reviews and drive alignment on major technical and product decisions.
• Influence technical direction and investment priorities across multiple teams and organizations.

Benefits

• Comprehensive health benefits and programs (medical, vision, dental, life insurance)
• 401(k)
• Employee discount
• Short term disability
• Long term disability
• Paid sick leave
• Paid national holidays
• Paid vacation

What This Job Offers

• Job Type: Full-time
• Career Level: Principal