Principal Data Scientist
Pulse Recruit – England, United Kingdom (Hybrid)
Pulse Recruit has been exclusively retained to appoint a Principal Data Scientist into a high-impact, consumer-facing organisation at a really interesting point in its evolution.
This is not a traditional data science role.
💡 This is about direction through hands-on technical leadership.
This isn’t about building from scratch.
It’s about taking what already exists and making it genuinely excellent.
You’ll shape how AI is built and deployed, staying close enough to the work to challenge, guide and improve it.
The Opportunity
This role sits at the intersection of Product, Engineering, and Leadership.
You’ll play a key role in defining direction by owning outcomes end-to-end, either delivering directly or guiding teams to the right solution.
You’ll be working across multiple teams, helping bring modern AI capabilities into production in a way that genuinely impacts customers and the business.
As highlighted in the brief, this is a position focused on ownership, innovation, and impact, with a strong emphasis on leadership, communication, and driving change across the organisation.
What you’ll be doing
🧠 Owning problems end-to-end, delivering directly or guiding teams to the right outcome
🚀 Leading high-impact initiatives from ideation through to production
🤝 Working closely with Product, Engineering, and senior stakeholders to deliver real outcomes, not just recommendations
🔬 Staying close to the work. Prototyping, reviewing, and challenging where needed
🏗️ Driving best practices across model development, deployment, evaluation, and scalability
🔍 Reviewing and improving AI systems already in production
📊 Identifying gaps in performance, evaluation, and observability
🧩 Aligning multiple teams on standards, tooling, and technical approach
🌍 Using Data Science to directly move business metrics
What we’re looking for
Proven experience operating at Principal or Staff level (not a people manager)
Technically credible. Able to get hands-on when needed and challenge effectively
Experience working with AI/ML systems in production
Strong Python, modelling, and experimentation background
Experience improving or scaling existing systems, not just building from scratch
Comfortable working across teams and influencing without authority
Commercially aware and able to connect work to real outcomes
Why this role stands out
🎯 True ownership – shape how AI is delivered, not just what gets built
🧩 High visibility – direct impact on business-critical systems already in production
🔥 Backed from the top – genuine investment in AI and data science
🌱 Opportunity to influence how a large organisation scales AI in a practical, real-world way
Package & Details
💰 £120k–£155k DOE + Bonus + Benefits
📍 Hybrid (UK-based)
⚠️ Must have the right to work in the UK (no sponsorship available)