Staff Data Scientist

Jackalope Digital LLC; Northern (KY); Hybrid; USD 189,000 - 255,000; Full time

Benefits offered by this job

Stock options

Remote-friendly culture

Job summary

DuckDuckGo's Data Science team is seeking a senior-level leader to drive product and business impact by improving our search engine ranking and results. You will own end-to-end projects, guide ML initiatives, and mentor teammates while collaborating with product teams to refine evaluation signals and deliver measurable improvements.

The role emphasizes production ML, NLP solutions, and AI-assisted development in a remote-first environment with equity and career growth opportunities.

Qualifications

• 10+ years of experience in Data Science with 2+ years at Staff, Principal, or Director level and proven project leadership.
• Experience advising others on complex data science work.
• Hands-on ML in production, NLP solutions, and AI-assisted development.
• Production-grade Python or a comparable high-level language.
• Advanced SQL and query optimization skills.
• Strong collaboration with product teams and driving team throughput.
• Preferred: running search-specific projects from scoping to production.
• Preferred: experience with large-scale search infrastructure (Vespa, Elasticsearch, OpenSearch, Solr).

Responsibilities

• Drive product and business impact by improving search engine ranking and results.
• Lead high-complexity data science projects from scoping to production.
• Collaborate with product teams to expand evaluation frameworks and surface ranking improvements.
• Explore and prototype AI features for ranking and relevance.

Skills

Data Science Leadership

Advising teams

Ambiguity strategy

ML in production

NLP solutions

Python coding

SQL optimization

Cross-functional collaboration

Search projects

Large-scale search infra

Tools

Vespa

Elasticsearch

OpenSearch

Solr

Job description

Who We Are

Hi, we're DuckDuckGo, the online protection company and remote-first team of 300+ on a mission to raise the standard of trust online. Founded in 2008 and profitable since 2014, annual revenue now exceeds $100m USD and millions use our browser on on Mac, Windows, iOS, and Android, our search engine, and the DuckDuckGo subscription. We also offer private, useful, and optional AI, including Duck.ai, which lets you chat privately with ChatGPT, Claude, and other AIs, all in one place. Our culture of trust, inclusivity, and empowered project management underpins everything we do, where each team member takes full ownership of their projects, from scoping and execution to postmortem. If you're seeking end-to-end ownership of your work, you've come to the right place!

Your Team and Role

Working on the Data Science Functional Team, you'll drive product and business impact through improving our search engine ranking and results. Recent projects include:

1. Improving first-phase ranking quality and precision without sacrificing latency

2. Developing new lexical-matching and document-authority signals

3. Expanding our search evaluations to measure relevancy readiness and surface ranking blindspots

4. Investigating LLMs for feature generation and ranking

Our data meets rigorous privacy standards and is necessarily sparse, so you'll need to think creatively to surface actionable insights in an evidence-first culture where quantitative rigor is the baseline, not the exception.

About You

• You have 10+ years of experience in Data Science, with 2+ years at Staff, Principal, or Director level, and a track record of leading high-complexity projects from scoping to production with minimal direction.

• You are comfortable advising others on complex data science work.

• You can develop strategies for ambiguous, complex data science problems and turn them into a series of well-defined projects.

• You have hands-on experience deploying ML in production, developing NLP solutions, and in AI-assisted development.

• You write production-grade code in Python or a comparable high-level language.

• You have advanced SQL and query optimization skills.

• You collaborate effectively with product teams and contribute to overall team throughput.

• Preferred experience:

  • Running search-specific projects (ranking, retrieval, or indexing) from scoping to production

  • Working with large-scale search infrastructure (e.g. Vespa, Elasticsearch, OpenSearch, or Solr)

Compensation

$222,033 USD annually and stock options. Compensation is identical within professional levels, regardless of geographic location or team. Compensation for each professional level is transparent across the organization.

Eligibility for company-sponsored health benefits is limited to team members based in the United States. This program does not extend to team members located in other countries, such as Canada or the UK.

Our Team Member Support Guide explains how we prioritize your wellbeing including paid parental leave, office setup, and co-working allowances.

Hiring Process

Hiring works best when it's a two-way street. Learn how we help you get to know DuckDuckGo, envision your future role here, and find out more about how we hire.

Diversity, Equity and Inclusion

DuckDuckGo provides equal work opportunities to all team members and applicants, and it prohibits discrimination and harassment of any type on the basis of race, color, ethnicity, caste, religion, age, sex (including pregnancy), national origin, disability status, genetics, protected veteran status, sexual orientation, gender identity or expression, or any other characteristic protected by our policies or federal, state, or local laws.

We want to ensure that our hiring process is accessible. If you need reasonable accommodation for any part of the application process because of a medical condition or disability, please send an email to

Please note that:

• You’ll be required to attend meetings on camera via video conferencing

• Expect to travel at least two times a year: once for our all-hands meetup and again for a team retreat (each around 4-5 days). While extenuating circumstances may impact attendance, everyone is strongly encouraged to attend.

• While we offer a flexible work arrangement with no core hours, expect an average full-time commitment of 40 hours per week.

• A successful candidate must pass a background check as a condition of joining the team.

• By applying for this role, you confirm that all information submitted is accurate and complete. You further acknowledge that providing false or fraudulent information during the application process is cause for denial of an offer, revocation of any existing offer, or other adverse action, up to and including termination after the start of your commencement of work.

Disclosure Statement: Use of AI in Hiring Process

As part of our commitment to enhancing our recruitment process, we utilize artificial intelligence (AI) technology to assist in reviewing and summarizing job applications and test projects, including those tools integrated into our recruitment vendor platforms. We use AI to flag potentially fraudulent applications, analyze and summarize applicants’ experience, interviews, and project performance, and help streamline our selection process.

Key Principles:

• Data Privacy: All information provided in your application will be handled in accordance with our Recruiting Privacy Policy. We ensure that your personal information is protected and used solely for recruitment purposes.

• Human Oversight and Accountability: The AI technology is designed to support our hiring team by providing insights and summaries of applications and evaluations of test projects against scoring rubrics. All final evaluations and hiring decisions, however, will be made by our hiring team, who will consider the AI's input alongside other factors.

• Transparency: We believe in transparency regarding our hiring practices. If you have any questions about how AI is used in our recruitment process, please feel free to reach out to us.

By submitting your application, you acknowledge and consent to the use of AI technology in our review process. If you would like to request an alternative selection process.