Senior Director, Software Engineering (Machine Learning)

Affirm; Remote; CAD 270,000 - 310,000; Full time

Job summary

A leading financial technology company is looking for a Senior Director to lead their Machine Learning capability. This role involves setting the vision for ML and AI, managing a team of modelers and engineers, and ensuring AI adoption across products. The ideal candidate has over 15 years of experience, proven leadership skills, and a successful track record in model development. The company offers a remote-first work environment with competitive benefits and a base pay range of $270,000 - $310,000 annually.

Benefits

100% subsidized medical coverage

Generous stipends for technology and lifestyle needs

Competitive vacation and holiday schedules

Employee stock purchase plan

Qualifications

• 15+ years of experience in Machine Learning or related fields.
• Experience leading centralized ML teams.
• Track record of successful model development.

Responsibilities

• Set vision for Machine Learning and AI at the company.
• Lead core model development lifecycle and business outcomes.
• Champion AI adoption across products.

Skills

Machine Learning

AI

Leadership

Team Management

Business acumen

Job description

Overview

Affirm is reinventing credit to make it more honest and friendly, giving consumers the flexibility to buy now and pay later without any hidden fees or compounding interest.

At Affirm, we’ve been very successful in delivering honest financial products that improve lives. Machine Learning has played a significant part in helping Affirm deliver on that mission. As we look into the future, we expect ML to continue to play an outsized role. We are therefore seeking to hire a Senior Director to lead centralized Machine Learning capability at Affirm.

What You’ll Do

• Set the vision for Machine Learning and AI at Affirm. Hire world class Machine Learning modelers, Platform and Software engineers to execute on that vision.
• Take ownership of our core model development lifecycle and business outcomes across our established verticals – underwriting, fraud, servicing, personalization.
• Work closely with product and business leadership to champion AI adoption in both existing and new products.
• Balance ML investments across traditional ML and transformer based models.
• Evolve ML platform to support our increasing ML needs across Affirm with a special emphasis on training, tuning and serving AI models.
• Run a robust, yet shortened ML development lifecycle establishing a culture for experimenting and failing fast.
• Work with a wide variety of cross functional partners outside of engineering ranging from product, risk, servicing, legal and compliance.

What We Look For

• 15+ years of relevant experience in Machine Learning, AI, or related technical domains
• Experience leading centralized ML teams comprising of both ML modelers and ML platform engineers
• Successful track record in landing key models responsible for the company’s success that directly drive PnL
• Comfortable working in matrix organizations and influencing across a wide variety of leaders.
• Experience hiring and growing, and retaining talent
• Keeps up with evolving ML landscape — understands when to buy vs build, and what tools/ techniques can drive the most business value

Base Pay and Equity

Base Pay Grade – V

Equity Grade – 13

Employees new to Affirm typically come in at the start of the pay range. Affirm focuses on providing a simple and transparent pay structure which is based on a variety of factors, including location, experience and job-related skills.

Base pay is part of a total compensation package that may include monthly stipends for health, wellness and tech spending, and benefits (including 100% subsidized medical coverage, dental and vision for you and your dependents). In addition, the employees may be eligible for equity rewards offered by Affirm Holdings, Inc. (parent company).

CAN base pay range per year: $270,000 - $310,000

Work Arrangements

Affirm is proud to be a remote-first company. The majority of our roles are remote and you can work almost anywhere within the country of employment. Affirmers in proximal roles have the flexibility to work remotely, but will occasionally be required to work out of their assigned Affirm office. A limited number of roles remain office-based due to the nature of their job responsibilities.

Benefits

We’re extremely proud to offer competitive benefits that are anchored to our core value of people come first. Some key highlights of our benefits package include:

• Health care coverage – Affirm covers all premiums for all levels of coverage for you and your dependents
• Flexible Spending Wallets – generous stipends for spending on Technology, Food, various Lifestyle needs, and family forming expenses
• Time off – competitive vacation and holiday schedules allowing you to take time off to rest and recharge
• ESPP – An employee stock purchase plan enabling you to buy shares of Affirm at a discount

We believe it’s On Us to provide an inclusive interview experience for all, including people with disabilities. We are happy to provide reasonable accommodations to candidates in need of individualized support during the hiring process.

[For U.S. positions that could be performed in Los Angeles or San Francisco] Pursuant to the San Francisco Fair Chance Ordinance and Los Angeles Fair Chance Initiative for Hiring Ordinance, Affirm will consider for employment qualified applicants with arrest and conviction records.

By clicking "Submit Application," you acknowledge that you have read Affirm's Global Candidate Privacy Notice and hereby freely and unambiguously give informed consent to the collection, processing, use, and storage of your personal information as described therein.