Head of Applied Data Science & AI Solutions

AppFolio Inc; California; On-site; USD 167,000 - 209,000; Full time

Job summary

AppFolio is seeking a Manager, Applied Data Science to lead the Platform Data Science team. You will guide data scientists building AI and ML products, including our signal engine, Next Best Actions, and NLP analytics.

You will balance hands-on work with strategic direction, bridging applied ML with SaaS go-to-market strategy. You will own modeling, data services, and governance while coaching a team, defining standards, and ensuring deliverables meet business needs across Sales, Marketing, and

Qualifications

• Bachelor's degree in a STEM field with 8+ years building and deploying predictive models in production.
• 2+ years leading data scientists as a people manager or technical lead.
• Strong programming with Python and SQL; experience bringing models to production.
• Experience deploying, monitoring, and retraining end-to-end models; preference for next-best-action systems.
• Experience with experimental design, holdouts, and measurement of incremental lift.
• Experience building LLM-based products in production and working with cloud data warehouses.
• Ability to set priorities with senior leadership and communicate actionable recommendations.

Responsibilities

• Own signal modeling and scoring logic for all AppFolio products and GTM personas.
• Own shared data science services, forecasting automations, and data access with governance.
• Maintain coding standards for model fleet, review gates, deployment, monitoring, and retraining.
• Review pull requests and ensure quality and risk management of models and analyses.
• Coordinate delivery with Sales, Marketing, Customer Success, and Finance; set priorities.
• Set direction for applied AI/ML in Data Science & Analytics with leadership.
• Manage and grow a team of Data Scientists: 1:1s, hiring, growth paths.

Skills

Python

SQL

Leadership

Machine learning

Experiment design

Communication

Education

Bachelor’s degree in STEM

Tools

Snowflake

dbt

Airflow

Salesforce

Job description

AppFolio is seeking a Manager, Applied Data Science to lead the Platform Data Science team. You will guide data scientists building AI and ML products, including our signal engine, Next Best Actions, and NLP analytics.

You will balance hands-on work with strategic direction, bridging applied ML with SaaS go-to-market strategy. You will own modeling, data services, and governance while coaching a team, defining standards, and ensuring deliverables meet business needs across Sales, Marketing, and