Azizi Othman’s Post

Writing a Good Job Description for Data Science/Machine Learning Things to do and things to avoid in order to find the right candidates for your open position Photo of a very good candidate by Thomas Butler on Unsplash I’ve probably been involved in the hiring process for data scientists a dozen times or more over my career, while never being the hiring manager myself, and I have been closely involved in writing the job description for several of these. It kind of seems like this should be easy — you’re just trying to convince people to apply for your job, so you can pick the one you like best, right? Well, it’s actually more complicated than that. Most of the people out there in the world are not qualified for any given job, and even among those who are qualified, there may be reasons they wouldn’t like working in this role. It’s not a one-way street; you don’t want just anybody to apply, you want the best suited people, for whom this job would work, to apply. So, how do you thread that needle? What should you write? This column is only my opinion and does not represent the views of my employer. I have not been involved in writing any job descriptions my current employer has posted, for ML or anything else. Why write a Job Description? To figure out what to write, let’s break down what it is a good job description is supposed to do, for a DS/ML job or for any other kind. Explain to candidates what the job is, and what they would do in the job Explain to candidates what qualifications you’re looking for in applicants These are the bare essential functions, although there are several other things your job description posting should also do: Make your organization seem like an attractive place to work for a diverse pool of qualified candidates Describe the compensation, work circumstances, and benefits, so candidates can decide whether to bother applying With this, we’re starting to get into more subjective and complicated components, in some ways. In some spots, I’m going to give advice for two different scenarios: first, for a small organization with few or zero existing DS/ML staff members, and second, for a medium or large sized organization with some DS/ML staff. These two can be quite different situations, with different needs and challenges in certain areas. You may notice I’m using “DS/ML” a lot in this article — I consider the advice here good for people hiring data scientists as well as those hiring machine learning engineers, so I want to be inclusive where possible. Sorry it’s a little clunky. What is this job? Firstly, for any organization, consider what kind of role you have open. I’ve written in the past about the different kinds of data scientist, and I’d strongly recommend taking a look and seeing what archetypes your role fits into. Think about how this person will fit into your organization, and be clear about that as you proceed. The Small Organization A challenge, especially for small organizations with ...

Writing a Good Job Description for Data Science/Machine Learning

Things to do and things to avoid in order to find the right candidates for your open position

Photo of a very good candidate by Thomas Butler on Unsplash

I’ve probably been involved in the hiring process for data scientists a dozen times or more over my career, while never being the hiring manager myself, and I have been clos...

Writing a Good Job Description for Data Science/Machine Learning Things to do and things to avoid in order to find the right candidates for your open position Photo of a very good candidate by Thomas Butler on Unsplash I’ve probably been involved in the hiring process for data scientists a dozen times or more over my career, while never being the hiring manager myself, and I have been clos...

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