Senior Data Scientist at Wattpad

Wattpad is a global multiplatform entertainment company whose vision is to entertain and connect the world through stories. Since 2006, we’ve been on a mission to use the power of community and technology to unleash the full potential of stories to the world. Every month 90 million people around the world spend over 23 billion minutes on Wattpad to share and discover stories they can’t find anywhere else.  Our brand banner includes: Wattpad, W Ventures, Wattpad WEBTOON Studios, Wattpad Books and Wattpad Brand Partnerships. We’re proudly based in Toronto, but our reach is global. Come build the future of entertainment and storytelling, and write your next chapter with us!

At Wattpad, we have a massive scale and reach across our global users; this is what makes us unique. It’s been an exciting time of growth, change and development for Wattpad. Working at Wattpad, you will have access to large and unique data sources. In addition to a massive corpus of stories, we work with engagement data such as comments, votes (i.e., likes), and conversations between readers and creators. These conversations and engagements have driven the popularity of hit fiction titles such as 'After', 'The Kissing Booth', 'I am a Gay Wizard', and many others. 

The Data Products & Services (DPS) team owns Wattpad’s Search and Recommendation system. We are a cross functional team of engineers and data scientists with the vision to connect millions of readers to the right story at the right time. We build recommendation engines and information retrieval systems to power everything from the “Home” page to “Search” and “Browse” experiences. If you have a passion for building discovery systems at massive scale, come join us to build the next iteration of our ML engines!


What you'll be doing:

Model complex problems, and identify opportunities through statistical, algorithmic, data mining, and visualization techniques
Validate findings using experimental and iterative approaches and present findings back to stakeholders
Designing experiments, preparing datasets, developing new models and creating prototype implementations focusing on applications to various challenging business problems
Build queries, conduct in-depth analysis and develop models to understand content, user engagement, and diversification
Prepare and integrate large, varied datasets and also maintain them to train models
Work cross-functionally to identify problems and turn data into knowledge which can be
actioned into product features or business decisions 
Work closely with live production systems and product teams, and deliver ML solutions at scale
Uphold high data science standards and best practices
Drive decisions such as assessing vendors in order to buy vs build/make
(DPS Team) Improve existing search and recommendation systems through experimentation, feature engineering, etc.
(DPS Team) Build features and develop new ranking algorithms



Do you have most of the following? If so, please apply!

You have a passion for machine learning
You have industry or academic experience with personalization, recommender systems or Natural Language Processing (NLP)
3+ years experience in an applied machine learning or quantitative role with knowledge in statistical machine learning and deep learning techniques
Experience in algorithm development and adapting existing algorithms to novel applications
Comfort working with complex, high dimensional data
Fluency with Python, and familiarity with one or more deep learning software frameworks such as TensorFlow or PyTorch
Familiarity with data extraction languages and tools (SQL or Apache Spark)
Development experience involving data pipelines and/or large-scale data processing
You have an understanding and/or experience of open-source ML frameworks (e.g. Tensorflow, TFX, PyTorch)
You love to deliver impactful products that accelerate the workflows of our business and end users
You have a systematic approach to project planning and dealing with ambiguity
You are able to articulate the strengths and weaknesses of solutions, and to reason about the compromises required for systems at scale
You have a solid understanding of Matrix Factorization and/or Factorization Machines
You have an understanding of Recsys metrics and evaluation methodologies



Bonus Points:

Good understanding of Stochastic Ranking, Bandit Algos and probabilistic methodologies such as (Variational Inference)
Experience with running Online Recsys experiments
Experience with Learning to Rank algorithms
Good understanding of Deep Learning based recsys (such as NCF, DeepFM, DCN etc.)
Have published in Recsys focused conferences such as ACM Recsys, KDD, WSDM, WWW etc.
You have experience in a technical/project leadership role



What we offer:

Competitive salary
Career development; we believe in mentorship and investing in your learning, supporting you to achieve your goals
Health benefits, fully covered by us!
RRSP Contributions (Canada), 401K Contributions (USA)
Generous vacation and Parental Leave Top-up
Monthly home office allowance, choice of hardware, flexible hours, and remote work options
Corporate discount for gym membership for you and your family
Summer Fridays with afternoons off!
And a whole lot more!



Wattpad is conducting all interviews in a distributed manner using applicable third party software where needed and using visual interface tools such as Google Hangouts and Zoom.

About Wattpad


Who are we? Entrepreneurs and Do-ers. Our vision is to entertain and connect the world through stories, and our mission is to use the power of community and technology to unleash the full potential of stories to the world.

What does that mean? We are visionaries, community builders, passionate problem solvers, storytellers, coffee snobs (tea drinkers, too!), curious by nature, and culturally diverse.

What are we obsessed with? Our users. Solving complex problems and maximizing flow. Learning constantly. Building the next great storytelling product. Finding the greatest stories ever told. Dogs (and cats), coffee, and good snacks.

How do we work? Autonomously, collaboratively, respectfully. Balancing with work, family, and play...and all while having a great time.

Wattpad is a remote friendly company and encourages remote candidates to apply as long as they are located and authorized to work in either the US or Canada (excluding Quebec) as a precondition of employment. We are not able to sponsor applicants for work permits. 

If you happen to live near the areas of either Toronto, Ontario or Halifax, Nova Scotia, you may also have the opportunity to work from our beautiful offices - 1 located in Downtown Toronto and the other in Downtown Halifax, both with easy access to transit.

Culture and Diversity

Wattpad is an equal opportunity employer. We do not discriminate. Period. 

Wattpad welcomes and encourages applications from people with disabilities. Accommodations are available on request for candidates taking part in all aspects of the selection process. We have taken a leadership position on creating a culture and an organization that truly values diversity. We are committed to fostering a global team that reflects the diversity of the Wattpad community. At Wattpad, we believe cultural fit doesn’t mean culturally identical, and diversity of thought helps us to challenge one another to think big and think differently. We consider employment applicants without regard to age, race, colour, national origin, citizenship, religion, creed, sex, sexual orientation, veteran status, marital status, disability status or any other protected status.  

If you have any special needs or accessibility requirements, please let us know. We will do our utmost to accommodate, in accordance with applicable local legislation.