Senior Data Scientist

Job overview

Are you a skilled data scientist ready to make a real difference for children and young people? Alder Hey Children's NHS Foundation Trust is looking for a Senior Data Scientist to join our Data Science team in Innovation Department.

This is a fixed-term, grant-funded position (supported by Charities Together) where you will be responsible for leading advanced risk modelling and machine learning projects aimed at enhancing services, efficiency, and outcomes for our patients and their families. Working primarily in Databricks using SQL and Python, you will develop models and analytical products on Trust datasets, turning complex data into clear, actionable insight.

You will work closely with clinicians, operational leads and digital colleagues across the Trust, translating real service needs into robust analytical solutions. This is a fantastic opportunity to apply your data science skills in a meaningful setting and supporting one of Europe's leading children's hospitals.

Main duties of the job

You will lead and manage multiple data science projects from requirements through to delivery, agreeing outputs, milestones and timescales with stakeholders. Your core work will involve designing, developing, validating and maintaining analytical and predictive models that address operational and clinical needs across the Trust.

Using Databricks as the primary development environment, you will build reproducible, auditable analytical workflows in SQL and Python, including data preparation, quality checks, feature engineering and modelling. You will also design and deliver reporting products and dashboards (for example in Power BI) to communicate clear, actionable insight to decision-makers.

A key part of the role is stakeholder engagement where you will work collaboratively with clinical, operational and digital teams to ensure your solutions are credible, fit for purpose and adopted in practice. You will communicate complex findings clearly through reports, presentations and visualisations to both technical and non-technical audiences.

You will maintain appropriate documentation and version control, comply with information governance requirements including UK GDPR and Caldicott Principles, and support colleagues through mentoring and sharing best practice.

Detailed job description and main responsibilities

The Senior Data Scientist will lead the design, development and delivery of advanced analytics and machine learning projects that support clinical and operational improvement across Alder Hey Children's NHS Foundation Trust.

Working primarily in Databricks using SQL and Python, the postholder will develop, validate and maintain analytical and predictive models on curated Trust datasets. This includes full responsibility for data preparation activities such as data quality checks, cleansing, preprocessing and feature engineering, ensuring all work follows agreed definitions and is reproducible and auditable.

The postholder will create reporting products and dashboards (for example using Power BI) that communicate clear, actionable insight to support decision-making. They will manage multiple concurrent projects, agreeing requirements, outputs, milestones and timescales with stakeholders and providing regular progress updates to the Head of Data Science, including early escalation of risks with proposed mitigations.

Stakeholder engagement is central to this role. The postholder will work closely with clinicians, operational leads and digital colleagues to ensure analytical outputs reflect the problem being addressed, are clinically and operationally credible, and can be adopted safely into routine practice. This includes communicating complex findings through written reports, presentations and data visualisations tailored to both technical and non-technical audiences.

The postholder will maintain appropriate documentation, version control and change control to support the safe development and deployment of new outputs. They will handle confidential and sensitive information in accordance with UK GDPR, the Data Protection Act 2018, Caldicott Principles and Trust policies.

The role also carries responsibility for supporting the professional development of colleagues, including mentoring junior staff and promoting best practice across the data science lifecycle. The postholder will provide cover for the Head of Data Science when required and support portfolio oversight activities as appropriate.

The postholder will be expected to maintain up-to-date knowledge of industry developments, best practice standards and emerging techniques relevant to data science in healthcare settings.

For full details, please refer to the attached job description and person specification.