Senior Staff Data Scientist

Waymo; Mountain View (CA); Hybrid; USD 281,000 - 356,000; Full time

Job summary

Waymo is seeking a Senior Staff Data Scientist to define evaluation metrics and frameworks for the Waymo Driver's behavioral performance. This hybrid role involves collaboration with engineering and product teams to ensure rigorous evaluation and actionable insights, contributing to the advancement of autonomous driving technology.

Benefits

Discretionary bonuses

Equity

Comprehensive company benefits

Qualifications

• PhD in a quantitative field with 7+ years of industry experience or 9+ years of relevant data science experience.
• Experience as a technical lead in a broad data science area.
• Expertise in advanced statistical methods and familiarity with ML systems/models.

Responsibilities

• Define successful behavioral launch metrics for the Waymo Driver.
• Develop evaluation frameworks for new operating domains.
• Provide actionable feedback on new software releases.

Skills

Statistical methods

Data analysis

Machine Learning

Education

Degree in a quantitative field

PhD in a quantitative field

Tools

Python

R

SQL

Job description

Join to apply for the Senior Staff Data Scientist role at Waymo

Waymo is an autonomous driving technology company with the mission to be the most trusted driver. Since its start as the Google Self-Driving Car Project in 2009, Waymo has focused on building the Waymo Driver—The World's Most Experienced Driver—to improve access to mobility while saving thousands of lives now lost to traffic crashes. The Waymo Driver powers Waymo One, a fully autonomous ride-hailing service, and can also be applied to a range of vehicle platforms and product use cases. The Waymo Driver has provided over one million rider-only trips, enabled by its experience autonomously driving tens of millions of miles on public roads and tens of billions in simulation across 13+ U.S. states.

Rigorous behavioral evaluation of the Waymo Driver is a critical part of scaling our ride hailing service and achieving Waymo’s ambitious goals. Autonomous driving presents a new paradigm in data science: in addition to leveraging data collected on-road, we generate our own data using state-of-the-art simulation technology—resulting in denser signals and challenging new problems in estimation and experimental design. Our data science team is tasked with providing early insights into the behavioral performance (safety, progress, quality) for new driving software, new hardware platforms, and new territories. We also develop and deploy statistical and testing methodologies to bolster the rigor and actionability of these insights. We work closely with the Onboard engineering team developing the Waymo Driver to ensure they have the evaluation tools to effectively iterate and improve behavior across a wide range of driving contexts. Our work ensures Waymo can achieve targeted behavioral improvements while maintaining the necessary strict safety standard.

This is a hybrid role reporting to the DS Lead for Onboard Behavioral Evaluation.

You Will

1. Define what a successful behavioral launch looks like for the Waymo Driver by balancing a large portfolio of behavioral metrics covering diverse driving contexts and developing data-driven strategies to evaluate behavioral tradeoffs across these contexts. This eval portfolio and tradeoff strategy will be deployed for use by hundreds of engineers as they iterate and evaluate potential behavioral changes.
2. Define and uphold a high bar for evaluation rigor. Be a gatekeeper ensuring evaluation signals are reliable for behavioral launch decisions. Identify and resolve gaps where current evaluation signals lack actionability.
3. Develop and adapt evaluation frameworks to accommodate evolving operating domains, including new territories and hardware platforms.
4. Leverage evaluation tools to provide rapid, actionable feedback on new software releases, and communicate findings to senior stakeholders.
5. Collaborate with product, engineering, and data science leads to align roadmaps, address codependencies, and set requirements for analysis tools and evaluation infrastructure.
6. Become an expert in the behavioral software underlying the Waymo Driver, including large-scale ML models, and act as an approver for behavioral software changes.
7. Contribute technically as a team member and leader, framing and solving ambiguous problems, championing data science excellence, and providing technical feedback.

You Have

• Degree in a quantitative field (e.g., Statistics, Mathematics, Physics)
• Either a PhD in a quantitative field with 7+ years of industry experience or 9+ years of relevant data science experience.
• Experience as a technical lead in a broad data science area.
• Expertise in advanced statistical methods and familiarity with ML systems/models.
• Proficiency with data analysis libraries and packages in Python, R, and/or SQL.

We Prefer

• PhD in a quantitative field
• A proven track record of independently driving data science projects that deliver business value
• Experience related to Autonomous Driving or Ride Hailing
• Experience with large-scale evaluation frameworks for software development
• Knowledge in areas like Deep Learning, Diffusion models, Traffic Modeling, Safety Evaluation or Prediction

The base salary range for this position in the US is $281,000—$356,000 USD, with actual pay based on location, experience, and skills. Additional benefits include discretionary bonuses, equity, and comprehensive company benefits.