Data Science Manager II (Research & Telematics)

CURRENT ROOT EMPLOYEES - Please apply using the career page in Workday. This career site is for external applicants only.

The Opportunity

We believe that a disruptive insurance company must have a principled quantitative framework at its foundation. At Root, we are committed to the rigorous development and effective deployment of modern statistical machine learning methods to problems in the insurance industry.

The Data Science Manager II in our Telematics group will lead a team of data scientists on projects in telematics modeling, 3rd party point-of-sale telematics integrations, customer coaching, telematics claims applications and continuous UBI. The DSM will regularly engage with members of various departments including Product, Actuarial, State Product Management, and Engineering, as well as the executive team.  

A DSM II will lead a small team of 3-5, providing coaching and feedback, helping overcome obstacles of all kinds, and coordinating with leadership throughout the company to ensure the utilization and deployment of Telematics work products.  They will be adept at cross-functional prioritization and roadmapping.  Finally, we expect a DSM II will still spend some time exploring data, building research pipelines and evaluating models on their own. 

Root is a “work where it works best” company. Meaning we will support you working in whatever location that works best for you across the US. We will continue to have our headquarters in Columbus to give more flexibility and more choice about how we live and work.

Salary Range:  $178,419 - $245,326  (Bonus and LTI eligible)

How You Will Make an Impact

• Leading, coaching, hiring and mentoring a team of 3-5 experienced data scientists  

• Collaborating with product and engineering teams to build shared priorities and roadmaps

• Creating robust predictive models for use in the telematics space, using machine learning to understand the limits of the possible, and GLMs and other model forms when necessary for regulatory approval

• Applying principled methods to evaluate deployed models and processes

• Building data science pipelines to quickly iterate on research ideas and put them into production

• Effectively communicating insights from complex analyses

• Ideating, supporting, and implementing deep research around big bet enhancements to telematics scoring, collection and/or usage

• Taking end-to-end ownership of problem domains and continuously improving upon quantitative solutions

What You Will Need to Succeed

• 5+ years of data science work experience

  • 2+ years of successful management experience

  • 2+ years of insurance industry experience

• Strong demonstrable knowledge of topics such as statistical modeling, machine learning, and numerical optimization

• Exceptional communicator with strong stakeholder management, timeline planning and delivery, and executive presentation skills

• Strong programming skills with experience using modern packages in either R or Python

• Expertise with databases and SQL

• Demonstrated experience building, validating, and applying statistical machine learning methods to real world problems

• Ability to lead cross-functional projects with a strong ownership mentality, taking initiative to find, prioritize, and be accountable for the highest impact work

• Preferred but not required:

  • Advanced degree in a quantitative discipline (PhD preferred) 

  • Experience using version control (Git) and cloud computing (AWS)

  • Telematics and/or pricing loss modeling experience

Studies have shown that women and people of color are less likely to apply to jobs unless they meet every single qualification. At Root, Inc., we are dedicated to building a diverse and inclusive workplace, so if you’re excited about this role but your past experience doesn’t align perfectly with every qualification in the job description, we encourage you to apply anyway!

At Root, we judge people based on the merit of their work, not who they are. If you are passionate about what this role entails and solving real problems, we encourage you to apply. We want to learn about you and what you can add to our team.

We’re harnessing the power of technology to revolutionize insurance. Using machine learning and mobile telematic platforms, we’ve built one of the most innovative FinTech companies in the world. And we’re just getting started.

Our success is in large part due to our unwavering standards in hiring. We recognize that our products are only as good as the people building and promoting them. We want individuals who find solutions by going through the cycle of ideation to implementation with curiosity, rigor, and an analytical lens. Ask anyone who works here and you’ll hear similar reasons for why they joined:

Autonomy—for assertive self-starters, the opportunities to contribute are limitless.

Impact—by challenging the way it’s always been done, we solve problems that have a big impact on our business.

Collaboration—we encourage rich discussion and civil debate at every turn.

People—we are inspired by the collection of crazy-smart people around us.