Senior Research Scientist, Human Data & Evaluation

Contra; San Francisco (CA); On-site; USD 150,000 - 200,000; Full time

Benefits offered by this job

Medical, Dental, Vision benefits

401k matching

Company laptop

Job summary

Contra Labs, based in San Francisco, seeks a researcher to own research engagements from scoping to delivery, turning ambiguous client questions into rigorous study designs and proposals.

You will work with cross-disciplinary teams on evaluation, data methodology, and insight synthesis, producing client-ready reports and publications while maintaining high research rigor under startup timelines.

Qualifications

• Master’s degree or PhD in HCI, design research, ML, or related field.
• Strong qualitative and quantitative research skills with experience in human evaluation.
• Proven ability to independently design and execute rigorous research projects.
• Ability to turn data and observations into actionable insights and directions.
• Proficient in Python and SQL for data analysis.
• Excellent written communication and ability to explain methodological tradeoffs.

Responsibilities

• Own research engagements from scoping through delivery.
• Design studies, evaluation protocols, and experiments across multimodal domains.
• Analyze qualitative and quantitative results and synthesize recommendations.
• Prepare client-ready reports, narratives, and publications.
• Collaborate with project leads, researchers, and data/engineering teams.
• Balance rigor with startup speed under tight timelines.

Skills

Qualitative research

Quantitative research

Python

SQL

Written communication

Education

Master’s degree

PhD

Equivalent industry research depth

Job description

Contra Labs, based in San Francisco, seeks a researcher to own research engagements from scoping to delivery, turning ambiguous client questions into rigorous study designs and proposals.

You will work with cross-disciplinary teams on evaluation, data methodology, and insight synthesis, producing client-ready reports and publications while maintaining high research rigor under startup timelines.