Principal Data Scientist

Role/Team overview

Data science is at the heart of decision making in Sky and drives a majority of decisions across marketing, customer interactions and customer services. In the Advanced Analytics team we are scaling up our data science practice to transform how we manage customers across all life cycles for both experience profitability. We have built and successfully deployed intelligence into Sky and are already delivering realisable value into the business. We gather a very large amount of data on customer behaviours and interactions and are looking for data scientists to extract value from our data assets and maximise customer value.

What you’ll do:

• Producing high‑quality, actionable insights through advanced analytics and cutting‑edge predictive algorithms: work as a self‑starter and be actively curious about what numbers are telling us and how they can be actioned upon to improve our customer experience.
• Designing and implementing innovative and commercially led data science and insights roadmaps with stakeholders (marketing, retention, service, finance) to improve the way they make decisions: hypotheses‑led problem solving to deliver solutions to business problems.
• Engage with our technology teams and data engineers to build compliant, efficient and scalable solutions.
• Strengthen our internal data science capabilities by continuously innovating and driving new ideas, building technology partnerships with our vendors, training and developing our people and creating a world‑class data science team at Sky.
• Engage with key stakeholders (marketing, retention, service, finance) to understand business objectives and support these objectives through best use of advanced analytics approaches.
• Responsible for identifying the best analytical techniques, developing the solution, creating a framework for testing the solution and measuring the incremental value to the business from the solution.

What you’ll bring:

• Deep expertise in machine learning and statistical modelling, with proven impact in areas such as personalisation, churn, pricing, and optimisation.
• Ability to quickly understand a business objective and problem solve to create an analytical solution, and develop a solution alongside stakeholders – essential.
• Commercial knowledge and applications of data science to drive commercial value is a must – everything we do drives value into the business.
• Hands‑on experience with Generative AI and LLMs, including prompt engineering, fine‑tuning, evaluation, and production deployment.
• Strong command of modern data stacks, including Python, SQL, Spark, BigQuery, and Snowflake.
• Clear communication skills, able to explain complex AI concepts, including LLMs and agentic systems, to both technical and non‑technical audiences.

Benefits and perks

• Sky Q, for the TV you love all in one place
• The magic of Sky Glass at an exclusive rate
• Discounted mobile and broadband
• A wide range of Sky VIP rewards and experiences

We've adopted a hybrid working approach to give more flexibility on where and how we work. The hybrid working expectations for this role are 2 days in the office per week.

Your office space

Our Osterley Campus is a 10‑minute walk from Syon Lane train station. Or you can hop on one of our free shuttle buses that run to and from Osterley, Gunnersbury, Ealing Broadway and South Ealing tube stations. There’s also plenty of bike shelters and showers.

On campus you’ll find 13 subsidised restaurants, cafes and a Waitrose. You can keep in shape at our subsidised gym, catch the latest shows and movies at our cinema, get your car washed and even get pampered at our beauty salon.

Just so you know: if your application is successful, we’ll ask you to complete a criminal record check. And depending on the role you have applied for and the nature of any convictions you may have, we might have to withdraw the offer.

Legal and Equality

We’re an equal opportunity employer and value diversity. We are a Disability Confident Accredited Employer, and welcome and encourage applications from all candidates. We will look to ensure a fair and consistent experience for all and will make reasonable adjustments to support you where appropriate. Please flag any adjustments you need as early as you can.

To be eligible for this role you are required to have the appropriate right to work in the UK. Please be aware Sky does not offer sponsorship for this position.