About this role.
Gopuff seeks a hands-on Director of Data Science to lead machine-learning strategy and a team of data scientists and ML engineers across consumer experience, delivery intelligence, and advertising. The role owns search, recommendations, personalization, ETA and dispatch modeling, demand forecasting, and ad-ranking capabilities. This leader will partner with Product, Engineering, Operations, Sales, and C-suite stakeholders to translate ML investments into measurable revenue, customer, and operational outcomes. The position requires deep applied ML expertise, people leadership experience, production ML infrastructure knowledge, and the ability to remain technically engaged in code and experimentation.
Role DNA
A quick view of the complexity, pace, ownership and collaboration implied by the job description.
Job Complexity
5/5Pace & Pressure
5/5Autonomy Level
5/5Communication Load
5/5Salary analysis
Estimated compensation compared with the broader US market for similar roles.
Core skills
Skills and capabilities most closely associated with this opportunity.
Sample interview questions
I would establish a common prioritization framework based on expected business impact, confidence in the opportunity, implementation effort, data and platform dependencies, and time to measurable learning. I would align the roadmap with executive goals, reserve capacity for foundational platform work, and use staged experiments to validate assumptions before making large investments.
I would define explicit objectives for relevance, conversion, advertiser value, customer experience, and platform revenue, with appropriate constraints to protect organic quality. The system would combine retrieval, feature-rich ranking, calibrated predictions such as CTR and CVR, auction signals, and offline plus online evaluation to monitor incremental value, customer outcomes, and marketplace health.
I would begin with a clear measurement plan and high-quality behavioral, catalog, inventory, and context features. I would build a retrieval-and-ranking architecture that can incorporate real-time signals, test contextual-bandit approaches where appropriate, and validate lift through controlled experiments across conversion, basket size, repeat purchase, and guardrail metrics.
I set outcome-based goals tied to product and operational metrics, require an evaluation plan before development begins, and review results through both model metrics and business metrics. I also build close product and engineering partnerships, define ownership through deployment, and encourage teams to stop or redirect work when experiments do not demonstrate meaningful value.
I would create clear role expectations and career paths, hire for complementary technical and product strengths, and provide regular coaching and meaningful ownership. Strong operating rhythms for technical review, experiment review, documentation, and knowledge sharing help maintain quality while giving people autonomy to solve important problems.
Gopuff is the go-to instant commerce platform, delivering everyday essentials in minutes. Powered by a network of fulfillment centers and cutting-edge technology, we serve millions of customers across the US and beyond. Data Science sits at the heart of how we delight customers, optimize operations, and grow our advertising business — and we’re looking for a leader to push all three forward.
As Director of Data Science, you will lead a high-impact team responsible for the models and intelligence that power Gopuff’s consumer experience, delivery network, and advertising platform. This is a hands-on leadership role — you’ll set technical direction, architect solutions, and write code alongside your team. You’ll partner closely with Product, Engineering, and Business leaders to translate complex ML capabilities into measurable business outcomes.
What We Offer
- Medical/Dental/Vision Insurance
- 401(k) Retirement Savings Plan
- HSA or FSA eligibility
- Long and Short-Term Disability Insurance
- Fitness Reimbursement Program
- 25% employee discount & FAM Membership
- Flexible PTO
- Group Life Insurance
- EAP through AllOne Health (formerly Carebridge)
What You’ll Do
Leadership & Strategy
Own the end-to-end data science roadmap across Consumer, Delivery, and Ads — translating business priorities into a coherent ML strategy with clear milestones and measurable ROI.
Provide strong technical direction and mentorship to a team of Data Scientists and ML Engineers; establish best practices for model development, evaluation, and deployment.
Partner with C-suite and senior product leadership to influence product strategy and build organizational confidence in ML-driven decision-making.
Drive a culture of experimentation: define measurement frameworks, champion A/B testing rigor, and hold the team accountable to business impact.
Consumer — Search, Recommendations & Personalization
Lead the design and continuous improvement of Gopuff’s search ranking and query understanding systems, including semantic search and intent modeling.
Build and scale personalization infrastructure that adapts the customer experience in real time — from homepage carousels to dynamic upsell and cross-sell surfaces.
Develop next-generation recommendation models (collaborative filtering, two-tower retrieval, contextual bandits) that drive basket size and repeat purchase.
Partner with Product to define upsell and nudge strategies grounded in behavioral signals and causal inference.
Work day to day with gopuff engineering teams to bring search and recommendation changes to life
Delivery Intelligence
Own the predictive models powering ETA accuracy, dynamic dispatch, and driver routing that underpin Gopuff’s speed promise.
Apply ML to optimize zone coverage, demand forecasting, and fleet utilization — directly impacting contribution margin.
Partner with Operations to turn model outputs into actionable tooling for fulfillment center and driver teams.
Ads & Monetization
Architect and own Gopuff’s ad ranking stack — query-ad relevance scoring, multi-objective ranking (revenue × customer experience), and auction mechanics.
Build CTR/CVR prediction models and closed-loop attribution pipelines for sponsored product, display, and offsite formats.
Define and improve advertiser-facing ML products: bid optimization, budget pacing, audience targeting, and incrementality measurement.
Collaborate with the Ads Product and Sales teams to grow advertiser ROI while protecting the organic shopping experience.
What We’re Looking For
Required
8+ years in applied data science or ML, with at least 3 years managing teams of scientists and engineers in a fast-paced tech or e-commerce environment.
Proven experience building and shipping Ad ranking or retrieval systems in e-commerce, marketplace, or search contexts — including relevance modeling and multi-objective optimization.
Deep expertise in modern ML architectures: two-tower retrieval, transformers, LLMs, contextual bandits, GNNs, and causal/uplift modeling.
Strong product intuition and business acumen — you can connect model improvements to revenue, NPS, and operational metrics and communicate this clearly to executives.
Hands-on coder: proficient in Python and comfortable diving into model code, experiment pipelines, and production systems.
Experience with large-scale ML infrastructure: familiar with feature stores, model registries, real-time serving, and experimentation platforms.
Track record of building and retaining diverse, high-performing data science teams.
Preferred
Prior leadership at a consumer marketplace, quick-commerce, grocery, or retail media company.
Familiarity with retail media network (RMN) measurement standards and privacy-preserving attribution techniques.
Experience with real-time personalization at scale, including streaming feature pipelines. Familiarity with Databricks and Snowflake is a plus.
Publications or presentations at NeurIPS, KDD, RecSys, SIGIR, or equivalent.
Why Gopuff?
Unique data moat: real-time demand signals from millions of orders, deep catalog and fulfillment data, and a first-party advertising signal set most companies can only dream about.
High-autonomy, high-impact: you’ll report to senior leadership and own the roadmap — no bureaucracy between your ideas and production.
Greenfield opportunity: many of these ML capabilities are being built from the ground up, giving you the chance to architect lasting systems.
Competitive compensation package including equity, performance bonus, and comprehensive benefits.
Compensation
- Gopuff pays employees based on market pricing and pay may vary depending on your location. The salary range below reflects what we’d reasonably expect to pay candidates. A candidate’s starting pay will be determined based on job-related skills, experience, qualifications, interview performance, and market conditions. These ranges may be modified in the future. Exceptions may be made for exceptional individuals. For additional information on this role’s compensation package, please reach out to the designated recruiter for this role.
- This role is eligible for a discretionary annual cash bonus and participation in Gopuff’s equity incentive plan.
- Base Salary Range: $215,000 – $275,000
Compensation
Additional Information
At Gopuff, we know that life can be unpredictable. Sometimes you forget the milk at the store, run out of pet food for Fido, or just really need ice cream at 11 pm. We get it—stuff happens. But that’s where we come in, delivering all your wants and needs in just minutes.
And now, we’re assembling a team of motivated people to help us drive forward that vision to bring a new age of convenience and predictability to an unpredictable world.
Like what you’re hearing? Then join us on Team Blue.
#LI-GOPUFF
Gopuff is an equal employment opportunity employer, committed to an inclusive workplace where we do not discriminate on the basis of race, sex, gender, national origin, religion, sexual orientation, gender identity, marital or familial status, age, ancestry, disability, genetic information, or any other characteristic protected by applicable laws. We believe in diversity and encourage any qualified individual to apply.
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