Staff Data Scientist

About SonderMind

At SonderMind, we know that therapy works. SonderMind provides accessible, personalized mental healthcare that produces high-quality outcomes for patients. SonderMind's individualized approach to care starts with using innovative technology to help people not just find a therapist, but find the right, in-network therapist for them, should they choose to use their insurance. From there, SonderMind's clinicians are committed to delivering best-in-class care to all patients by focusing on high-quality clinical outcomes. To enable our clinicians to thrive, SonderMind defines care expectations while providing tools such as clinical note-taking, secure telehealth capabilities, outcome measurement, messaging, and direct booking.

To follow the latest SonderMind news, get to know our clients, and learn about what it’s like to work at SonderMind, you can follow us on Instagram, Linkedin, and Twitter. 

About the Role

As a Staff Data Scientist at SonderMind you will be a leader in the technology organization (product, engineering and applied science), working on solving a diverse set of problems in the mental healthcare space. From helping clinicians grow and manage their practices, to personalizing self-care and matching appropriate providers with clients who are ready for clinical care, your primary role will be to drive success for all of these scenarios through the development of data-driven ML/AI services. This role will also play a large role building and monitoring generative AI agents in production. As an integral part of the product and engineering team our data scientists deploy data products with immediate positive impact to our providers and clients.

What you will do 

• Lead technical initiatives at the intersection of applied science and product engineering, identifying new opportunities for data-driven product solutions and driving end-to-end execution from ideation through production
• Deploy, document, and test production ML/AI services (models, prototypes, etc.) to continuously improve client & provider experiences on the platform
• Collaborate with engineering teams to integrate ML/AI based functionality
• Build, test, and monitor generative AI agents, inclusive of RAG implementation and context-aware API information retrieval 
• Fine-tune language models and navigate open source model embeddings strategies for multiple production use cases
• Lead algorithm and architecture design decisions for new and ongoing ML/AI initiatives
• Conduct code reviews and guidance on best practices

Key Technologies to be used 

• Python
• Pandas
• Numpy
• PyTorch
• Scikit-learn
• Pydantic
• SQL (PostgreSQL and Snowflake)
• NoSQL (DynamoDB, Elasticsearch)
• AWS Services: Sagemaker, Lambda, Athena, Glue, Feature Store
• Sentence transformers and open-source language models (BERT, Ada, LLaMA, etc.)
• REST API services
• Kubernetes and Docker
• Vector Databases (PGvector, pinecone, etc.)
• Git/Gitlab
• LaunchDarkly

What does success look like?

The data products being developed in this role will directly impact clinicians and their clients at all stages of their mental healthcare journey: The ideal candidate is someone who is passionate about designing and implementing ML/AI data products and systems in this space, and has the technical skillset to directly contribute to these initiatives as they ramp up. A strong sense of language model embeddings and fine tuning capabilities, combined with familiarity with GenAI agentic strategies is a must. As time goes on the candidate should be able to independently identify and communicate new opportunities where data science may be applied to improve clinician and client workflows and healthcare quality. Technical success in this role will be measured by the delivery of production services and demonstrated leadership to problem solve challenges along the way. Cultural success in this role will be measured by positive cross-functional interactions and a curious, solution-oriented approach to questions and conversations brought to the applied science and data engineering organization.

Who You Are 

• Ph.D. (preferred) or M.S. in a quantitative science such as computer science, engineering, data science, applied mathematics, statistics, etc.
• 5+ years of preparing and deploying ML/AI data products
• Prior experience at early- to mid-stage growth companies is preferred
• Experience in the health-tech and/or mental health space is a strong bonus
• Strong statistics and experimental design background
• Proficiency with Python programming language
• Expertise in recommender systems utilizing multiple underlying technologies such as reinforcement learning and collaborative filtering
• Proficiency with generative AI models/framewords, language embeddings, fine tuning and/or transfer learning
• Predictive modeling and expertise with multiple optimization frameworks such as gradient descent, particle swarm optimization, simulated annealing, quadratic programming, and Bayesian optimization

Our Benefits 

The anticipated salary range for this role will be $144,000-180,000.

As leaders in redesigning behavioral health, we walk the walk with our employees' benefits. We want the experience of working at SonderMind to accelerate people’s careers and enrich their lives, so we focus on meeting SonderMinders wherever they are and supporting them in all facets of their lives and work.

Our benefits include:

• A commitment to fostering flexible hybrid work
• A generous PTO policy with a minimum of three weeks off per year
• Free therapy coverage benefits to ensure our employees have access to the care they need (must be enrolled in our medical plans to participate)
• Competitive Medical, Dental, and Vision coverage with plans to meet every need, including HSA ($1,100 company contribution) and FSA options
• Employer-paid short-term, long-term disability, life & AD&D to cover life's unexpected events. Not only that, we also cover the difference in salary for up to seven (7) weeks of short-term disability leave (after the required waiting period) should you need to use it.
• Eight weeks of paid Parental Leave (if the parent also qualifies for STD, this benefit is in addition which allows between 8-16 weeks of paid leave)
• 401K retirement plan with 100% matching which immediately vests on up to 4% of base salary
• Travel to Denver 1x a year for annual Shift gathering
• Fourteen (14) company holidays
• Company Shutdown between Christmas and New Years
• Supplemental life insurance, pet insurance coverage, commuter benefits and more!

Application Deadline

This position will be an ongoing recruitment process and will be open until filled.

Equal Opportunity 
SonderMind does not discriminate in employment opportunities or practices based on race, color, creed, sex, gender, gender identity or expression, pregnancy, childbirth or related medical conditions, religion, veteran and military status, marital status, registered domestic partner status, age, national origin or ancestry, physical or mental disability, medical condition (including genetic information or characteristics), sexual orientation, or any other characteristic protected by applicable federal, state, or local laws.