Head of Data Science Production

About Yara:

Yara was founded in 1905 to solve an emerging famine crisis in Europe. Since then, we have worked tirelessly to offer sustainable crop nutrition and environmental solutions to farmers, industrial customers and consumers across the globe. Today Yara is a global company operating in more than 160 countries and employing more than 17,000 individuals – all working hard to fulfill our mission of responsibly feeding the world and protecting the plant. We offer a world of opportunity to those who want to join us in this calling.

Being the world’s leading crop nutrition company, Yara is also the world's largest producer of ammonia, nitrates and NPKs. Our Production segment is thus an integral building block for delivering on our mission – with a clearly stated ambition to become world-leading on metrics such as safety, environmental footprint, quality and production costs. Long term, the target is the “Plant of the Future” with zero emissions, and low capex/opex. Building on a lean transformation, we are now ramping up our focus on digital solutions to help us achieve this ambition. 

To lead this effort, we have established a global unit called Digital Production. The success of Digital Production and its solutions is a key priority for Yara, and we plan to significantly grow our efforts within this field. In this context, we are currently looking for forward leaning and enthusiastic leaders to help us build our team and execute on our ambition.

About the role:

A critical focus area for Digital Production is to leverage the vast quantity of data generated as part of our operations. We are convinced this data holds significant business value. In fact, we believe it could help us optimize our production, increase the quality of our products, reduce our emissions, increase the safety of our workers, and more. As our Head of Data Science Production you play a critical role in ensuring we are able to do just that.

Few elements are currently in place. As an early member of the team, you will get to define and build them. This includes making technical and process choices such as which languages and tools you see your team using. You’ll also get to select and build the team that together will form a world class data science function.

Building from scratch also means that you will need to get your “hands dirty” and get into the practical details of getting stuff done. In return you have the chance to shape our philosophy for industrial data science. We intend to build thought leadership on the topic - in our own industry, and beyond - and you will be driving this effort.

At the same time you get to work with some of the most ambitious people in industry on our journey to feed the world and protect the planet. How many other places can you do that?

Responsibilities

• Build and manage the full data science stack in Yara Production – people, process and technology
• Recruit a strong data science team. Take the team from strong to world class through mentoring and developing each individual
• Build Yara’s position as a thought leader on data science for industry (both internally and externally). As part of this, ensure the data science team uses and develops latest thinking, methodology, tools and techniques in the field
• Help execute a variety of business critical initiatives driven by our Solution teams through developing, testing and implementing data analytics and algorithmic solutions
• Participate in the full life cycle of solutions, from early stage rapid prototyping through to scaled implementation and continuous improvement after initial launch
• Drive education and evangelization of data sciences throughout the business

Profile

• MS/PhD in Computer Science, Machine Learning, Applied Math, Statistics, Physics, or similar
• 5+ years of experience in a senior data science role, preferably for a company where data was used as a key competitive advantage or was essential to the bottom line. You have deployed large-scale, production machine learning systems
• Proven people leadership skills. You have experience leading a team - and enjoy attracting, developing and retaining the best
• Highly proficient and experienced in scripting languages, statistical and modelling packages, and rapid prototyping
• Solving hard statistical modelling and machine learning problems truly excites you. To do this, you are constantly stretching your toolbox of capabilities, including breaking new ground when required
• You are an effective communicator of technical concepts to both technical and non-technical resources
• Pragmatic. You focus on results, and get things done.
• Process industry experience is an asset

Additional Information

The Head of Data Science Production position will report to VP Digital Production and is a member of the Digital Production management team. The role will work out of Oslo or Brussels and closely together with relevant units globally. Travel to production sites and other Yara locations is expected.

As a global organization we actively strive to reflect the diversity in society. We therefore encourage all qualified applicants from all background to apply, and are committed to creating a work environment that fits gender equality and allows combining career progress with the needs of a family or other personal circumstances.

Apply no later than

Apply till March 22th 2019