NLP Data Scientist

Starling’s mission is to build a fairer, smarter, and more human alternative to traditional banks.

We are a fast-moving, disruptive technology company with an inspiring female founder, a best in class product, and a commitment to the environment. We’re just getting started.

Now it’s your turn to join our mission.

We are a fully licensed UK bank, and we have the culture and spirit of a fast-moving, disruptive technology company and are obsessed with providing our customers with the best banking app and money management experience around.

Everyone at Starling gets the chance to own interesting things from day one, and we’re told one of the best things about working here is the ability to achieve a lot in a short space of time.

We are looking for Data Scientists with experience in Deep Learning and Natural Language Processing to help the bank solve complex problems using Machine Learning. This role will be broad in scope and you can expect to collaborate with many teams in order to advise, support and develop processes using the most appropriate methodology for the topic in hand. If you love building Machine Learning based solutions in an R&D driven environment then we’d love to hear from you.

The Role:

• You will be part of a team delivering data driven solutions and insights to improve the speed, efficiency, and quality of decision-making
• Work proactively with technical and non-technical teams to deliver insights to support the wider business
• Build, test and deploy models which will improve and/or automate decision making
• Provide insightful analytics across the bank to assist with decision making
• Engage with Engineering teams to ensure we capture data points that are relevant and useful for insights and modelling

Requirements

We’re open-minded when it comes to hiring and we care more about aptitude and attitude than specific experience or qualifications. We think the ideal candidate will encompass most of the following:

• Demonstrable industry experience in Data Science/Machine Learning, ideally inNatural Language Processing
• Experience in industry or research using modern NLP techniques (TF-IDF, LDA, LSTM, NER, Topic Modelling, Embeddings, Transformers etc.)
• An education inMachine Learning, Natural Language Processing or similar field is highly advantageous
• Proficient in spaCy, Gensim, HuggingFace, Tensorflow/PyTorch
• Desire to build explainable ML models (using techniques such as SHAP)
• Excellent skills in Python and SQL
• Demonstrable experience deploying machine learning solutions in a production environment
• Strong data visualisation and communication skills are essential

Benefits

Starling technology works in a hybrid pattern both from home and one of our three offices. We’re open to applications from across the UK including fully remote, if you’re hybrid our preference is that you’re located within a commutable distance to either our London, Southampton or Cardiff office, so that we’re able to see each other and collaborate in person too.

• 25 days holiday (plus public holidays)
• An extra day’s holiday for your birthday, taken a week on either side of the day
• 16 hours paid volunteering time a year
• Part-time and/or flexible hours available for most roles
• Hybrid/remote working
• Private Medical Insurance with VitalityHealth including mental health support and cancer care. Partner benefits include discounts with Waitrose, Mr&Mrs Smith and Peloton
• Generous family-friendly policies
• Enhanced sick pay
• Contributory pension scheme
• Varied social groups set up and run by our employees
• Perkbox membership giving access to retail discounts, a cashback scheme, a wellness platform for physical and mental health, a birthday box and weekly free coffee
• Access to ‘salary sacrifice’ benefits such as Cycle to Work scheme

Full details are available on our careers site

About Us:

Starling is a leading digital bank on a mission to disrupt the banking industry.

Since our launch in 2014, we've surpassed 2 million accounts, including over 350,000 business accounts. Our total deposits, meanwhile, have topped £5 billion and we have lent over £2bn over the same period. We're a fully licensed UK bank, and we have the culture and spirit of a fast-moving, disruptive technology company. We've won the Best British Bank award four years running, and now employ over 1500 people across our London, Southampton, Cardiff & Dublin offices.

Starling Bank is an equal opportunity employer, and we’re proud of our ongoing efforts to foster diversity & inclusion in the workplace. Individuals seeking employment at Starling Bank are considered without regard to race, religion, national origin, age, sex, gender, gender identity, gender expression, sexual orientation, marital status, medical condition, ancestry, physical or mental disability, military or veteran status, or any other characteristic protected by applicable law.

By submitting your application, you agree that Starling Bank may collect your personal data for recruiting and related purposes. Our Privacy Notice explains what personal information we may process, where we may process your personal information, its purposes for processing your personal information, and the rights you can exercise over our use of your personal information.