Lead Machine Learning Engineer

We strongly encourage applications from people of colour, the LGBTQ+ community, people with disabilities, neurodivergent people, parents and people from lower socio-economic backgrounds. If there’s anything we can do to make adjustments for you in the hiring process, please don’t hesitate to let us know. We’re intentional about building a diverse, inclusive and equitable environment. Check out our diversity, equity and inclusion statement.

Looking to do work that matters?

We get it – it’s why most people come to Cleo. Together we’re fighting for the world’s financial health, building an AI that helps our users make the best money decisions from day one. We’ve helped 5 million people so far with personalised insights and a voice you don’t expect in FinTech. But it’s time to do more.

As we enter the next phase, we’re looking for more improvisers, data geeks and grown ups who want to own their work and create meaningful change.

The team 

You’ll join the existing Data Science function here at Cleo; a thoughtful and collaborative chapter of 20 dedicated data scientists & ML engineers, with significant industry experience that is at the heart of everything we do at Cleo. You’ll build and deploy production models that developers will feed directly into the product.

This position is essential in the expansion of both product and business. We are highly data driven, whether that be understanding patterns in users’ cashflow, scoring credit risk, or determining which of Cleo’s features is best suited to a user. We have interesting problems to solve on an ever-increasing scale.

You’ll take ownership of the intelligent optimisation of payments, a significant workstream that has a direct impact on the company’s financial performance. Your role will involve collaborating closely with others in your cross-functional team to investigate and comprehend business issues. You will use your analytical abilities to generate potential solutions and employ machine learning techniques to enhance processes. In the longer term, the role could incorporate other ML applications such as fraud detection and credit risk. 

What you’ll be doing

• Improving our current machine learning models and deploying into production
• Actively building and productionising classifiers - no dependencies on engineering teams
• Collaborating with various departments within the organisation, including product, operations, and commercial, to leverage machine learning and analytics in order to uncover opportunities for optimization
• Carrying out deep analysis into the core aspects of how Cleo runs to be able to fully understand the levers and propose opportunities to improve
• Working closely with engineers to make sure we collect the right data to produce relevant business insights

About you

• At least 5 years of experience in data science, ML engineering or related roles
• Ability to write production quality code in Python and SQL
• Experience deploying machine learning models into production
• Track record in payments, pricing, or other business process optimisation problems
• Comfortable with complexity & developing a holistic understanding of a system in order to propose & build solutions
• A strong ability to communicate findings to non-technical stakeholders in a concise and engaging manner

Nice to have

• Experience with the US payments ecosystem
• Experience with containers and container orchestration: Kubernetes, Docker, and/or Mesos, including lifecycle management of containers

What do you get for all your hard work?

• Salary banding can be seen here. You’ll also have equity options. You can view our progression framework and salary bandings here: https://cleo-ai.progressionapp.com/ - This role would be from level DS4 depending on experience 
• Work at one of the fastest growing tech startups, backed by top VC firms, Balderton & EQT Ventures.
• Cleo is a culture of stepping up. We want, and expect you to grow and develop. That means trying new things, leading others, challenging the status quo and owning your impact. You’ll have our support in everything you do. But more importantly, you’ll have our trust.
• We treat you as humans first, employees second. Because we can’t fight for the world’s financial health, if we’re not healthy ourselves. This means the usual perks but it also means flexibility.
• Other benefits include; 
• 25 days Annual leave a year + public holidays (+an extra day for every year you spend at Cleo)
• Regular lunch-and-learns as part of a general learning culture
• Online courses and internal training to level up your skills like from coding, to SQL, to management training 
• Choose your own gear, ask for the tools you need, and we’ll seek them out for you 
• Cleo socials and activities 
• Online mental health support via Spill
• We’ll pay for your OpenAI subscription 
• A clear career progression path through Progression https://cleo-ai.progressionapp.com/ 
• And many more!

UK App access: The Cleo app is no longer downloadable in the UK (but only until next year). If you’re an existing user, you’ll still have access to the app. But some features won’t be available (just for a little while). Why? 99% of our users are based in the US – where financial health is often overlooked. We’ve decided to shift our focus to where we can provide the most value and make the greatest impact for users who need it most. Then we’ll be able to apply what we learn to better support our UK users in the future. Check out this page for more information.