Linguist III

PTR Global; Redmond (WA); Hybrid; USD 76,000 - 83,000; Full time

Benefits offered by this job

Job summary

PTR Global seeks a Linguist III to determine speech data needs and set a strategic vision for data-based model improvements. You will apply linguistics, phonetics, and computational linguistics to support language models and evaluation tools.

The role involves designing experiments, developing labeling workflows, and refining transcription processes. Hybrid work from Redmond or Burlingame offers exposure to ASR and NLP collaboration.

Qualifications

• Bachelor's degree in linguistics, language technologies, computational linguistics, or speech science.
• Fluent knowledge of foundational linguistics including phonetics and phonology.
• Experience with SQL and Python for data tasks.

Responsibilities

• Provide linguistic expertise in phonetics, phonology, lexicography, dialectology, and NLP.
• Design experiments to evaluate transcription quality.
• Develop manual and automated processes for concurrent projects and labeling quality.
• Create and refine text normalization and inverse text normalization processes.
• Manage lexical/transcription metadata and related data.
• Analyze system metrics and address issues in lexicon coverage and POS tagging.

Skills

Foundational linguistics

SQL

Python

Education

Bachelor's degree in linguistics or related field

Tools

SAMPA

IPA

ToBI

Job description

Position:

Linguist III

Location:

Redmond, Washington/ Burlingame CA (Hybrid)

Duration:

6 Months contract with Possible extension

Job ID:

179967

Job Overview:

The main function of a Linguist III is to determine speech data needs and set a strategic vision for data-based model and product improvements. This role requires expertise in linguistics, phonetics, and computational linguistics, as well as technical skills to support the development and evaluation of language models and related technologies.

Responsibilities:

• Provide linguistic expertise in areas such as phonetics, phonology, lexicography, dialectology, and natural language processing (NLP).
• Design and conduct experiments to evaluate transcription quality.
• Develop manual and automated processes for multiple concurrent projects, including ensuring high-quality label alignments, prosodic classification, POS identification and disambiguation, targeted modeling data, and user feedback.
• Create and refine text normalization and inverse text normalization processes.
• Manage lexical and phrasal transcriptions and related metadata.
• Analyze system metrics such as user opinion, lexicon transcription coverage, and POS tagger performance, and address identified issues.

Qualifications:

• Knowledge of phonetics, phonology, sociolinguistics, dialectology, and other areas of linguistics.
• Ability to analyze waveforms and spectrograms.
• Familiarity with prescriptive writing and punctuation conventions for at least one language.
• Excellent verbal and written communication skills.
• Experience with transcription and annotation systems such as SAMPA, IPA, and ToBI.

Education/Experience:

• Bachelor's degree in linguistics, language technologies, computational linguistics, speech science, or a related field.

Must-Have Skills:

• Foundational linguistics background (BA/MA/PhD in linguistics) with applied linguistics knowledge, including phonetics, phonology, and familiarity with spoken vs. written forms.
• Technical skills in SQL and Python.
• Strong technical writing skills to produce clear guidelines, documentation, and analysis write-ups.

Nice-to-Have Skills:

• Experience in computational linguistics or automatic speech recognition (ASR), including quality evaluation using WER/CER/SER, dataset creation, and quality assessment (both commissioned and synthetic).
• Hands‑on experience with human grading operations, including grading data, writing guidelines, and training annotators.
• Experience with both offline/synthetic data and live traffic quality evaluation for voice assistants.

Candidate Profiles That May Not Be a Fit:

• Pure data science or engineering backgrounds without linguistics expertise.
• Professional translation or localization backgrounds without relevant linguistic or technical skills.

About PTR Global:

PTR Global is a leading provider of information technology and workforce solutions. PTR Global has become one of the largest providers in its industry, with over 5000 professionals providing services across the U.S. and Canada. For more information visit At PTR Global, we understand the importance of your privacy and security. We NEVER ASK job applicants to:

• Pay any fee to be considered for, submitted to, or selected for any opportunity.
• Purchase any product, service, or gift cards from us or for us as part of an application, interview, or selection process.
• Provide sensitive financial information such as credit card numbers or banking information. Successfully placed or hired candidates would only be asked for banking details after accepting an offer from us during our official onboarding processes as part of payroll setup.

Pay Range:

$55- $60

The specific compensation for this position will be determined by several factors, including the scope, complexity, and location of the role, as well as the cost of labor in the market; the skills, education, training, credentials, and experience of the candidate; and other conditions of employment. Our full‑time consultants have access to benefits, including medical, dental, vision, and 401K contributions, as well as PTO, sick leave, and other benefits mandated by applicable state or localities where you reside or work.

If you receive a suspicious message, email, or phone call claiming to be from PTR Global do not respond or click on any links. Instead, contact us directly at 1 . To report any concerns, please email us at

During the hiring process, we may use artificial intelligence (AI) tools to assist in evaluating information related to your application. These tools may help analyze job‑related qualifications or assist recruiters in reviewing applications and interview responses. AI‑generated information is one factor considered in our hiring process. Final employment decisions are made by qualified hiring personnel and are not based solely on AI‑generated recommendations.