Data Scientist

Drive Innovation and Forge Your Career with Us!

• Salary: Up to £50,000 per annum.
• Work Days & Hours: Monday to Friday, 37.5 hours per week.
• Working Policy: Flexible hybrid-working policy, with a minimum of two days a week from our Chester head office.
• Team: Data & Analytics.
• Reports to: Data Science Manager.

About Us

The Forge Holiday Group encompasses Sykes Holiday Cottages, Forest Holidays, UKcaravans4hire and Bachcare in New Zealand. We unite under four core company values that serve as the foundation of everything we do: Being One Team, Owning It, Communicating Honestly. Learning, Growing, and Innovating. These values ensure we remain true to our original ethos and ensure we stay true to our Customers, Owners and Colleagues alike.

About the Data Scientist Role

As a Data Scientist in our Data & Analytics team, you’ll drive innovation and value creation. Our data science squad applies advanced analytics, machine learning, and AI to deliver impactful initiatives that support business growth and strategic decision making.

Our tech stack, built for efficient model delivery, includes Amazon SageMaker with Python for model development and evaluation. A dedicated data engineer supports the full ML lifecycle, optimising pipelines for smooth transitions from development to production.

This role is tailor-made for an enthusiastic individual eager to apply their expertise in data science to solve real-world business challenges and contribute to the continuous advancement of our organisation's data-driven capabilities.

Your Responsibilities:

• Engage collaboratively with stakeholders across various departments to understand business challenges and opportunities, and know the right questions to ask to identify actionable data-led solutions
• Design innovative data science solutions to leverage advanced algorithms and techniques to extract actionable insights from complex datasets.
• Undertake exploratory data analysis
• Develop high-quality data science models, with a rigorous approach to quality assurance ensuring that models have a trusted foundation
• Developing and deploying production quality code (with the support of ML ops)
• Write comprehensive, well-written documentation.
• Championing the adoption of data-driven decision-making practices across the organisation, and fostering a culture of curiosity, experimentation, and learning that empowers individuals to harness data as a strategic asset
• Communicating Insights Effectively: Distilling complex data findings into clear, concise, and compelling narratives that resonate with diverse audiences, facilitating understanding and buy-in at all levels of the organisation.

Personal development

Stay ahead of the curve by following industry trends, emerging technologies, and best practices in data science and analytics.Any other duties that are within the scope, spirit and purpose of the job as requested by your line manager.

Essential Experience:

• Communication with a commercial audience (data visualisation/ stakeholder influencing)
• Ability to apply SQL and Python's ecosystem for data analysis (Jupyter, Pandas, Scikit Learn, Matplotlib, etc)
• Deployment experience in ML/AI services (desirable in Amazon Sagemaker or equivalent).

Additionally you should have an understanding of:

• Statistical and predictive modelling concepts.
• Classical machine learning algorithms (e.g. logistic regression, random forest, XGBoost, etc)
• Stateof-the-art research areas (e.g. NLP, transfer learning etc)
• Modern deep learning algorithms (e.g. BERT, LSTM, etc)
• Model evaluation techniques
• Data preprocessing techniques (standardisation, normalisation, etc.).

Nice to have:

• Graduate (ideally MSc or PhD) in a quantitative degree
• Strong communication and interpersonal skills
• Entrepreneurial attitude.

Benefits

• Access to our annual STIP (annual company-wide bonus) scheme with an additional 5% of your salary
• 33 days annual leave including bank holidays
• Plus an additional day off for your Birthday and two volunteering days per year
• An enhanced maternity and paternity policy
• Employee discounts and benefits with your wellbeing at the centre
• Comprehensive training and development programs to set you up for success
• Study support for additional qualifications, courses and accreditations
• Numerous dedicated wellbeing initiatives and access to 24/7 mental health support
• On-site gym at our Chester HQ.

Diversity and Inclusion:

We encourage and welcome our people to bring their authentic and best selves to work every day. We know the power that comes from different ideas, backgrounds and perspectives. We recognise the role diversity plays in achieving our goals as a business. We actively welcome applications from as wide a range of backgrounds as possible. If you need any particular support or accommodations as part of your application process, please get in touch - our recruitment team are happy to help.

Apply now to be a part of our inclusive and supportive work environment, where you'll find excellent opportunities for career progression and personal development!