RocheData Science - Engagement Lead
AI in this role
At Roche you can show up as yourself, embraced for the unique qualities you bring. Our culture encourages personal expression, open dialogue, and genuine connections, where you are valued, accepted and respected for who you are, allowing you to thrive both personally and professionally. This is how we aim to prevent, stop and cure diseases and ensure everyone has access to healthcare today and for generations to come. Join Roche, where every voice matters.
The Position
As a Data Science - Engagement Lead, you will join the Global Analytics and Technology Center of Excellence (GATE) within Roche Services & Solutions (RSS) in San José, Costa Rica. In this high-impact, technical leadership role, you will architect advanced enterprise AI solutions, mentor data science talent, and serve as a strategic consultant across global business divisions (Commercial, R&D, Diagnostics). Operating in an agile environment, you will drive predictive, causal, and generative AI initiatives while shaping GATE-level product strategy, talent enablement, and cross-center innovation.
The Opportunity
Technical Leadership & Mentorship: Lead and mentor Senior Data Scientists across Predictive AI and Causal & Experimentation AI sub-teams, fostering modular coding standards, MLOps best practices, and agile delivery.
Strategic Business Consulting: Act as a trusted AI consultant to global executive stakeholders, translating complex healthcare and business challenges into actionable Data Science and AI strategies.
GATE Strategy & Product Roadmap: Drive GATE-wide center initiatives, shaping AI product development strategy, talent enablement programs, and standard methodologies across the ecosystem.
Rapid Prototyping & ROI: Design and build Proofs of Concept (POCs), prototypes, and business cases to demonstrate tangible value and secure executive buy-in.
Advanced AI Architecture: Architect robust predictive models, causal inference frameworks (A/B testing, quasi-experiments), and Enterprise Generative AI solutions (RAG, fine-tuning, Agentic AI workflows).
End-to-End MLOps & Delivery: Partner with Data Engineering and MLOps teams to design, operationalize, and maintain scalable ML/AI pipelines, ensuring automated deployment and monitoring.
Agile Collaboration: Collaborate across global cross-functional teams, facilitating reviews, demos, and retrospectives to continuously enhance solution delivery.
Who You Are
Bachelor’s or Master’s degree in Data Science, Statistics, AI/ML, Computer Science, Quantitative Analytics, or a related field. Professional certifications in Data Science, Cloud AI, or GenAI are advantageous.
12+ years of overall experience in Data Science/AI, including 5+ years leading AI product lifecycles and mentoring data science teams.
Proven track record in predictive modeling, causal inference, LLMs, RAG, and Agentic AI frameworks (e.g., LangChain, AutoGen, CrewAI).
Hands-on experience with Python, SQL, modern pipeline tools (dbt, PySpark), MLOps platforms (MLflow, Kubeflow, AWS SageMaker), containerization (Docker, Kubernetes), and AWS.
Exceptional communication and consulting skills with a demonstrated ability to present business cases to executive leadership (pharmaceutical or healthcare domain experience is a plus).
Must be currently based in Costa Rica or hold valid work authorization for San José.
No relocation benefits are offered for this position.
Who we are
A healthier future drives us to innovate. Together, more than 100’000 employees across the globe are dedicated to advance science, ensuring everyone has access to healthcare today and for generations to come. Our efforts result in more than 26 million people treated with our medicines and over 30 billion tests conducted using our Diagnostics products. We empower each other to explore new possibilities, foster creativity, and keep our ambitions high, so we can deliver life-changing healthcare solutions that make a global impact.
Let’s build a healthier future, together.
Roche is an Equal Opportunity Employer.
How we score this
Data Science - Engagement Lead at Roche scores 69 out of 100 on AI centrality, which makes it AI Level 3 of 4 (Works on AI) on this board. The level measures how much of the work is AI, not seniority.
AI Level 3. The daily work is on or around AI systems, without necessarily building the model: remove AI and the job is hollow.
- AI Level 480 to 100
- AI Level 360 to 79
- AI Level 240 to 59
- AI Level 10 to 39
Bands come from how often the tools, models and workflows of the role are named in the posting itself. Open the description and count.
Prepare for this job
A free preview built only from this posting: what it asks for, what you could be asked in an interview, and how to adjust your resume.
Skills and AI tools this role asks for
Questions you could be asked
- How would you design a retrieval step so the model answers from real data instead of guessing?
- Walk me through fine-tuning a model: what data did you use, and how did you check the result?
- How do you monitor a model once it's live, and how do you know it needs retraining?
- What's a project where you used LangChain hands-on?
- Walk me through how you've used CrewAI in your day-to-day work.
Adapt your resume
- List these exact terms on your resume: Rag, Fine Tuning, Ml Ops, LangChain, and CrewAI. An applicant tracking system matches the wording, not the idea.
- Attach one line of real, concrete experience to at least one of them — a tool named with nothing behind it rarely survives a human read.
- Show where AI is part of your daily process, not a one-off project — this role expects it to be a running habit.
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