Principal Data Scientist- Decisioning

Citizens Financial; United States; Hybrid; USD 149,000 - 194,000; Full time

Benefits offered by this job

Healthcare coverage

Retirement benefits

Education reimbursement

Flexible work arrangements

Wellness programs

Job summary

Citizens Financial is seeking a Principal Data Scientist to design, build, and improve quantitative models that strengthen customer relationships and drive measurable business outcomes.

You will lead the development of statistical, machine learning, and causal inference solutions from problem definition through deployment, monitoring, validation, and refinement, partnering with marketing, product, finance, risk, and technology teams.

Qualifications

• Master's degree in statistics, economics, engineering, CS or related quantitative field; PhD preferred.
• 10+ years applying advanced analytics and delivering models through full development lifecycle.
• Deep knowledge of statistical modeling, causal inference, and experimental design.
• Experience estimating heterogeneous treatment effects using randomized experiments, uplift modeling, and causal ML.

Responsibilities

• Lead development of statistical, ML, and causal inference solutions from problem definition to deployment, monitoring, and refinement.
• Evaluate targeting and decision performance using experimentation and counterfactual analysis to improve outcomes.
• Develop methods estimating incremental impact and treatment effects for decisioning.
• Translate business objectives into analytical requirements and actionable plans.
• Partner with cross-functional teams to integrate models into production decision systems.
• Synthesize findings into clear narratives and recommended actions for varied audiences.
• Communicate assumptions, tradeoffs, and limitations with proper documentation and governance.
• Guide continuous improvement of analytical systems by incorporating results into future models.

Skills

Python

SQL

Statistical modeling

Causal inference

Experimental design

Stakeholder management

Communication

Education

Master's degree (statistics/economics/engineering/CS)

PhD preferred

Tools

Amazon SageMaker

AWS

Job description

The Enterprise Data & Analytics organization is seeking a Principal Data Scientist to design, build, and improve quantitative models that strengthen customer relationships, improve decision quality, and drive measurable business outcomes.

Responsibilities

• Lead the development of statistical, machine learning, and causal inference solutions from problem definition through deployment, monitoring, validation, and continuous refinement.
• Evaluate targeting and decision performance using experimentation, counterfactual analysis, quasi-experimental techniques, and observational data to improve customer and business outcomes.
• Develop methods that estimate incremental impact, treatment effects, and heterogeneous customer response to support more effective and economically sound decisions.
• Translate ambiguous business objectives into defensible analytical problems, measurable outcomes, analytical requirements, and practical implementation plans.
• Partner with data science, marketing, product, finance, risk, data, and technology teams to integrate models into governed business processes and production decision systems.
• Synthesize analytic findings into a clear and approachable story and set of recommended actions, reducing complexity as appropriate for different audiences.
• Communicate assumptions, tradeoffs, limitations, and recommendations clearly while maintaining appropriate documentation, controls, and ownership.
• Guide the continuous improvement of analytical systems by incorporating experimental results, operational outcomes, and observed customer behavior into future models and targeting strategies.

Qualifications

• Master's degree in statistics, economics, engineering, computer science, or a related quantitative field; PhD preferred.
• 10+ years of experience applying advanced analytics and delivering models through the full development lifecycle, including deployment, monitoring, governance, and ongoing improvement.
• Deep knowledge of statistical modeling, causal inference, and experimental design, with a demonstrated ability to improve decision quality and targeting through estimation and counterfactual reasoning.
• Experience estimating heterogeneous treatment effects and incremental value using randomized experiments, causal machine learning, quasi-experimental techniques, uplift modeling, and contextual bandits to support customer-level personalization and decisioning.
• Experience designing, executing, and evaluating experiments, including randomization strategy, holdouts, guardrails, outcome measurement, and causal interpretation of results.
• Strong Python and SQL skills (with 5+ years of applied experience each), including experience building reproducible analytical pipelines and working efficiently with large, complex datasets.
• Experience with cloud computing platforms (preferably AWS) and ML-related services such as Amazon Sagemaker.
• Ability to balance analytical rigor, interpretability, implementation complexity, and business usefulness under evolving priorities.
• Strong stakeholder-management and communication skills, including the ability to explain complex analytical, experimental, and causal concepts in clear, unambiguous language.
• Financial services experience and familiarity with related customer-level behavior, profitability, personalization, and relationship analytics preferred.

Hours & Work Schedule

• Hours per Week: 40
• Work Schedule: Monday - Friday
• Hybrid: 4 days per week onsite and 1 day remote

Pay Transparency

The salary range for this position is $149,000 - $194,000 per year, plus an opportunity to earn an annual discretionary bonus. Actual pay is based on various factors including but not limited to the budget, work location, and relevant skills and experience.

We offer competitive pay , comprehensive medical, dental and vision coverage, retirement benefits, maternity/paternity leave, flexible work arrangements, education reimbursement, wellness programs and more. Note, Citizens' paid time off policy exceeds the mandatory, paid sick or paid time-away policy of every local and state jurisdiction in the United States. For an overview of our benefits, visit https://jobs.citizensbank.com/benefits .