Data Scientist

takealot.com, a leading South African online retailer, is looking for a highly talented Data Scientist to join our team in Cape Town.

We are a young, dynamic, hyper-growth company looking for smart, creative, hard-working people with integrity to join us.  We offer a market related, Total Remuneration Package which allows full flexibility according to your needs, a great work environment and a promise that you won’t be bored as long as you are prepared for a challenge and want to build something great.

Reporting to the Head of Merchant Analytics

Your responsibilities will include:

• Identify opportunities where data science methods will significantly improve the Merchant division’s performance in areas such as forecasting, promotions planning, scenario modelling, pricing, replenishment and assortment planning, amongst others.
• Plan, prioritise and manage a roadmap of work that maximises value-add with limited time
• Develop solutions according to the roadmap using appropriate methods, depending on the problem
• Measure, report and continuously improve model performance
• Work closely with the Analytics team to brainstorm, identify opportunities and guide the roadmap
• Work closely with the BI team to produce consolidated, transformed data sets, where appropriate
• Work closely with the Software Engineering and Machine Learning Engineering  teams to deploy and maintain relevant models in our production environment, ensuring Engineering best practices are adhered to.
• Communicate opportunities and solutions effectively to relevant stakeholders, from Software Engineers to Business Executives
• Collaborate and share knowledge with the analytics teams across the company

Attributes required:

• Strong business acumen
• Proficient with advanced methods for regression, optimisation, classification and unsupervised learning problems
• Proficient at modelling algorithms in either R or Python
• Proficient at gathering and wrangling big data sets from various sources including, SQL databases, cloud services, APIs,Excel/Google Sheets
• Good communications skills with the ability to present complex information in a clear and concise manner to a variety of audiences.
• Eager to learn and stay up to date with industry trends
• Creative problem-solving skills
• Strong prioritisation skills
• Ability to build good practical solutions quickly with iteration rather than big-bang perfect solutions

Qualifications:

• Bachelor’s Degree in Engineering, Mathematics/Statistics, Computer Science or similar
• Master’s Degree in Data Science, Advanced Analytics or similar highly beneficial
• 3-5 years experience in Data Science or Analytics roles
• Experience deploying models into production environments is beneficial
• Experience in Retail industry is beneficial

We seek to Employ an Extra Ordinary Mind who:

• is respectful but forthright
• is an expert at doing, who can not only design but also execute
• is analytical, able to use data to make decisions
• is competitive, self-directed and strive to be the BEST (GREAT requires a lot of work and does not only happen during business hours)
• is passionate about the potential of e-commerce and delivering a world-class customer experience
• is entrepreneurial, thrives under change and accepts it is a constant and always looks for solutions to do something better and faster
• is business SMART. Able to think about problems from a business perspective using technical and product input;
• is curious and challenge the status quo
• is innovative and enjoys iteration
• is collaborative
• will be at the cutting edge of developing new concepts for takealot.com
• thinks like an owner of the business
• is SMART, has INTEGRITY and is HARD WORKING

If you meet the above you are an Extraordinary Mind so come and join us!

Takealot is an Equal Opportunity Employer. Applicants from the previously disadvantaged groups and people with disabilities will be given preference.