DEADLINE: 03/06/2025

Data Scientist

Full-time

ABSA Bank is hiring a Data Scientist responsible for identifying patterns and trends in complex data sets and developing data-driven algorithms and models to solve key business challenges. By leveraging statistical analysis, machine learning, and data engineering techniques, the role enables value extraction from data and supports strategic, data-informed decision-making across the organization.

Job Description

Key accountabilities

Accountability: Data Analysis & Modeling – 45%

Collect, clean, and preprocess structured and unstructured data from various sources.
Perform exploratory data analysis (EDA) to uncover trends, correlations, and anomalies.
Develop, test, and validate predictive models and machine learning algorithms to solve key problems or exploit opportunities including but not limited to:

- Fraud detection
- Marketing personalisation
- Credit decisioning
- Customer churn
- Product recommendations
- Customer experience
- Customer interaction
- Optimize model performance and ensure scalability for deployment in production environments.

Accountability: Business Insight & Communication – 35%

Translate complex analytical results into clear, actionable business insights.
Create dashboards, visualizations, and reports to communicate findings to stakeholders.
Present data-driven recommendations to both technical and non-technical audiences.
Support strategic decision-making by aligning insights with business objectives.

Accountability: Collaboration & Data Governance – 20%

Partner with cross-functional teams (e.g., IT, Product Team, Marketing & Customer Experience) to integrate data science solutions into business processes.
Ensure data quality, integrity, and consistency across systems and workflows.
Adhere to ethical standards and data privacy regulations in all data handling activities.
Contribute to the development and maintenance of data governance frameworks and best practices.

Role/person specification

Preferred Education

Bachelor’s or master’s degree in data science, Computer Science, Statistics, Mathematics, or a related field.
Relevant professional certifications in data science, analytics, machine learning, artificial intelligence, and cloud platforms are considered added advantages

Preferred Experience

At least 5 years’ experience in working with big data sets
Financial domain knowledge is an added advantage

Knowledge And Skills

Technical Proficiency – Strong foundation in statistics, machine learning, programming (Python, R, SQL), data visualization, and cloud platforms.
Analytical & Problem-Solving Skills – Ability to work with complex datasets, perform advanced analysis, and extract actionable insights with attention to detail.
Communication & Collaboration – Skilled in conveying technical findings to diverse audiences and working effectively within cross-functional teams.

Education