What are the responsibilities and job description for the Director, Data Science position at PFF?
Job Details
DIRECTOR OF DATA SCIENCE
PFF is the global leader in the collection, analysis, and application of sports data. With clients spanning the majority of the professional and college football landscapes - along with major media entities and sports fans worldwide - PFF is at the forefront of revolutionizing how football is played, coached and consumed. Our data-driven insights empower teams, broadcasters, and fans with cutting-edge analytics that drive smarter decisions on and off the field.
Toward these aims, our team is seeking an experienced and innovative Director of Data Science to lead our data science initiatives and drive the development of AI driven football analytics. This role will be responsible for overseeing the research, modeling, and deployment of advanced statistical and machine learning methods to extract meaningful insights from PFF’s rich dataset. The ideal candidate will have a passion for sports analytics, a deep understanding of data science methodologies, and a proven track record of leading high-performing teams.
Role Requirements
- Lead and develop the data science team, fostering a culture of innovation, collaboration, and continuous learning.
- Work closely with cross-functional teams, including engineering, product, and design to integrate data-driven insights into PFF’s products and services.
- Identify relevant new research topics whose solutions will add value to our products or result in new products.
- Perform the necessary research toward solutions for problems posed by both our data science team itself and by other stakeholders.
- Ensure scalability and efficiency of data science models in real-world applications, improving speed, accuracy, and reliability using industry leading best practices.
- Stay ahead of industry trends in sports analytics, AI, and machine learning to keep PFF at the forefront of data and AI driven football insights.
- Effectively communicate insights to both technical and non-technical stakeholders, translating complex data into actionable football intelligence.
Skills & Experience
- 10 years of statistical modeling and machine learning experience is required with at least 3 years in a leadership role managing teams.
- Expert grasp of software architecture, development practices/tools especially in regards to large-scale datasets is required.
- Experience designing, building, testing, deploying and maintaining predictive AI/ML models at scale and in production environments is required.
- Proficiency in Python, R, SQL, and cloud-based data platforms.
- Excellent communication and collaboration skills are required.
- A deep understanding of football analytics, player tracking data, and advanced metrics is required.
Qualifications
Skills & Experience
- 10 years of statistical modeling and machine learning experience is required with at least 3 years in a leadership role managing teams.
- Expert grasp of software architecture, development practices/tools especially in regards to large-scale datasets is required.
- Experience designing, building, testing, deploying and maintaining predictive AI/ML models at scale and in production environments is required.
- Proficiency in Python, R, SQL, and cloud-based data platforms.
- Excellent communication and collaboration skills are required.
- A deep understanding of football analytics, player tracking data, and advanced metrics is required.
