Manager, Data Science & Machine Learning

Lightspeed Commerce; Canada; On-site; CAD 155,000 - 165,000; Full time

Benefits offered by this job

Flexible paid time off

Remote work policies

Equity options

Pension plan

Health and wellness benefits

Job summary

Lightspeed Commerce in Canada is seeking a Manager, Data Science & Machine Learning to lead a high‑performing team and deliver production‑ready ML solutions across the organization. You will drive model delivery from experimentation to production, set standards, mentor staff, and collaborate with stakeholders to align on priorities.

You will also guide data science enablement, partner with MLOps for deployments, and foster a culture of learning and impact across teams.

Qualifications

• 3+ years hands-on data science with production deployment experience.
• 4+ years managing a data science team including hiring and coaching.
• Experience with ML engineering practices: serving, monitoring, retraining pipelines.
• Familiarity with cloud ML platforms (AWS, GCP, or Azure).
• Strong Python skills and ability to review code and models.

Responsibilities

• Lead full lifecycle of data science & ML models from experimentation to production.
• Manage team priorities, unblock work, and maintain delivery standards.
• Define best practices for modeling, code quality, experimentation, and documentation.
• Advise other data science teams and promote cross‑team collaboration.
• Collaborate with MLOps for production releases and maintenance.
• Set expectations and goals, conduct regular 1:1s and calibrations.
• Identify growth opportunities and develop team development plans.
• Foster a culture of experimentation and learning from failure.

Skills

Data science leadership

Python proficiency

ML engineering / MLOps

Strategic thinking

Communication

Tools

MLflow

Vertex AI

Databricks

Job description

Are you actively looking for a new opportunity? Or just checking the market? Well… you might just be in the right place!

We’re looking for a Manager, Data Science & Machine Learning to join our Data team in Canada. The Manager, Data Science & Machine Learning is a hand-on leader, responsible for guiding a high-performing team of data scientists to deliver impactful, production-ready solutions across the organization. This role is responsible for driving Data Science & Machine Learning model delivery from experimentation through production, owning the Data Science Enablement roadmap planning while contributing to the Data Office’s org roadmaps, and building the team capabilities needed to scale the practice.

What you’ll be doing:

Data Science Management & Enablement

Lead, oversee and own, as needed, the full lifecycle of Data Science & Machine Learning models from experimentation to production deployment.

Own the day-to-day management of the team by ensuring the right work is being prioritized, the team is unblocked, and delivery standards are consistently met.

Define, document, and champion data science best practices: covering modeling standards, code quality, experimentation frameworks, and documentation.

Serve as a subject matter authority and internal resource for other data science teams: advising on methodology, reviewing approaches, and helping teams solve complex or ambiguous problems.

Collaborate with Data Science leads in other parts of the business to align on standards, share learnings, and create a cohesive data science community of practice. Additionally, surfacing opportunities for collaboration, flagging where work is being duplicated, and brokering knowledge transfer across the organization.

Collaborate with the MLOps team on the production release and ongoing maintenance of their models.

Set clear expectations, and individual performance goals for all direct reports.

Conduct regular 1:1s, provide timely and actionable feedback, and lead performance calibrations.

Identify growth opportunities, sponsor stretch assignments, and build individualized development plans.

Foster a collaborative team culture where experimentation and learning from failure are encouraged. This includes new AI/ML features or other experimental approaches.

Stakeholder Management & Communication

Participate in project planning and technical brainstorming sessions with business stakeholders and other Data Office leads as an expert to help design and translate business problems into technical briefs and communicating results in non-technical terms.

Proactively manage expectations, surface risks early, and influence across cross-functional teams.

Represent the team's work in leadership forums, steering committees, and quarterly business reviews.

And a little bit of....

Contributing as part of the wider team to achieve organizational objectives even if this means doing things that aren’t strictly within the scope of your role.

What you need to bring:

3+ years of hand-on data science experience, with direct personal experience deploying models to production (not just experimentation or prototyping).

Demonstrated experience with ML engineering practices that include model serving, monitoring, drift detection, retraining pipelines, and/or feature stores. You don't need to be an engineer, but you need to manage them credibly.

Familiarity with modern MLOps tooling (e.g. MLflow, Vertex AI, Databricks).

4+ years of experience with directly managing a team of data scientists, including hiring, performance management, and career development.

Proficiency in Python; comfortable reading and reviewing code, models, and pipeline logic.

Strong understanding of supervised/unsupervised ML, model evaluation, and common failure modes in production.

MLOps fluency to collaborate with Senior ML engineers in defining standards, reviewing infrastructure decisions, and unblocking technical challenges.

Comfort with cloud-based ML platforms (AWS, GCP, or Azure) and data warehousing environments.

Strategic thinking, you can zoom out to prioritize for impact, then zoom in to help unblock.

Strong communication, you can translate complex technical work for executive audiences without over-simplifying.

Structured thinking, you can rapidly assess a new project idea across value, feasibility, risk, and strategic fit

Ability to proactively identify dependencies, risks, and blockers before they become escalations

Strong prioritization instincts, ability to thrive in ambiguous environments, and navigate a large volume of competing project ideas to focus the team on the highest-value work

A flexible work environment that empowers you to do your best work

A culture that celebrates performance

The chance to make an impact in a team that’s big enough for career growth, but lean enough to make your voice heard

Career-defining opportunities

Plus benefits designed to keep you happy, healthy and fulfilled.

Flexible paid time off and remote work policies

Equity options, because this is your company too

Contributions to your pension plan. Your future matters

Training opportunities to grow your skills and career

Health and wellness credit so you feel your best

Time off to volunteer and give back to your community

Interest groups, employee led networks, social committees to sponsored sports teams

Computer purchase program to get your personal Macbook

Enhanced parental leave to support growing families

Fuel your growth. Find your people.

At Lightspeed, your growth is our priority. We invest in you with continuous learning opportunities, global mobility and benefits designed to support you—all within a driven, diverse and inclusive team that’s passionate about empowering our communities.

Please note that we ask applicants to disclose any criminal convictions, and we conduct criminal record checks as part of our hiring process for this role.

At Lightspeed, we carefully consider a wide range of factors when determining compensation, including your skill set, qualifications, experience, and market data. These considerations can cause your compensation to vary. We reasonably expect the total compensation for this position to be in the range of $155-165K CAD. Lightspeed also provides a variety of employee benefits including, but not limited to, medical, dental, wellness, life and disability insurance, RRSP plan and match, paid parental leave top-up, and paid time off.

Please note that this compensation information is solely for candidates hired to perform work within Ontario and reflects the amount Lightspeed is willing to pay at the time of this posting. This role represents an existing vacancy at Lightspeed. Lightspeed uses artificial intelligence–enabled tools to support certain aspects of the recruitment process; all hiring decisions are made by our recruiting and hiring teams.

Lightspeed is a proud equal opportunity employer and we are committed to creating an inclusive and barrier-free workplace. Lightspeed welcomes and encourages applications from people with disabilities. Accommodations are available on request for candidates taking part in all aspects of the selection process.

Where to from here?

Obviously, this has to be mutually beneficial: we want you to step into a role you love, and we want to offer you a place you’re proud to come to every day. For a glimpse into our world check out our career page here .

Lightspeed is building communities through commerce, and we need people from all backgrounds and lived experiences to do that. We were founded in 2005, in Montreal’s gay village and our original members were all part of the LGBTQ+ community. The ethos of our business has been about inclusion from the very beginning, and we strive to provide a workplace where everyone belongs.

Who we are:

Powering the businesses that are the backbone of the global economy, Lightspeed's one-stop commerce platform helps merchants innovate to simplify, scale, and provide exceptional customer experiences. Our cloud commerce solution transforms and unifies online and physical operations, multichannel sales, expansion to new locations, global payments, financial solutions, and connection to supplier networks.

Founded in Montréal, Canada in 2005, Lightspeed is dual-listed on the New York Stock Exchange (NYSE: LSPD) and Toronto Stock Exchange (TSX: LSPD). With teams across North America, Europe, and Asia Pacific, the company serves retail, hospitality, and golf businesses in over 100 countries.