Data Scientist - London

About Hiscox: At Hiscox we care about our people. We hire the best people for the work, and we’re committed to diversity and creating a truly inclusive culture, which we believe drives success. We embrace hybrid-working practices, balancing the ability to work remotely with the culture and energy we experience when we are face‑to‑face in our offices. Our focus on collaboration and cross‑functional working is supported with virtual tools that minimise physical travel, hot‑desking neighbourhoods that create a physical sense of community and Team Charters that our teams co‑create to set out how they’ll work together.

This modern way of working has contributed to impressive employee engagement scores across Hiscox and means we’re delivering even better solutions for our Hiscox Colleagues. As an international specialist insurer we are far removed from the world of mass market insurance products. Instead we are selective and focus on our key areas of expertise and strength - all of which is underpinned by a culture that encourages us to challenge convention and always look for a better way of doing things. We insure the unique and the interesting. And we search for the same when it comes to talented people. Hiscox is full of smart, reliable human beings that look out for customers and each other. We believe in doing the right thing, making good and rebuilding when things go wrong. Everyone is encouraged to think creatively, challenge the status quo and look for solutions.

The Data Scientist will work as part of a wider technical team whose wide ranging efforts span multiple business functions. This is an ideal role for an individual who is passionate about the use of analytics to influence decisions and is keen to learn more about delivering value through the use of data.

Key Responsibilities:

• Leveraging industry standards, emerging methodologies and empirical research to develop critical inputs to business information, and helping business leaders develop innovative approaches to driving their business.
• Working on the end‑to‑end data solution including understanding complex business challenges, designing scientific solutions, working large and small data sets (including 3rd party and internal data of a wide variety), using cutting‑edge machine learning or statistical modelling techniques to derive insights.
• Work collaboratively with data scientists, data engineers and other technical people including pricing teams in order to help support maturation of analytics practice within the organization.
• Work closely with other members of the data and analytics community at Hiscox, contributing to delivering value through the use of a range of analytics techniques.
• Over the next 18 months you will be working with the Major Property team to accelerate the adoption of a variety of data science techniques to our day‑to‑day underwriting.

Person Specification:

• Experience of data science, advanced analytics or a genuine interest to learn.
• Experience of data science / data analysis in a commercial capacity.
• Experience in developing predictive and prescriptive analysis (predictive modelling, machine learning or data mining) used to draw key business insights and clearly articulate findings for target audience.
• Experience with analytical tools / programming languages and databases (for example: R, Python and SQL).
• Interest in a variety of machine learning techniques from simple linear models and random forests to deep learning.

Nice to have:

• Degree in a STEM or closely related field.
• Experience of data science in finance, insurance or Ecommerce is an advantage but not required.

Skills:

• Knowledge of insurance, especially Lloyd’s and/or property insurance is an advantage but not essential.

Rewards:

• On top of a competitive salary, we also offer a wide range of benefits.
• 25 days annual leave plus two Hiscox days.
• 4 week paid sabbatical after every 5 years of service.
• Company and personal performance related bonus.
• Contributory pension.
• Money towards gym membership.
• Christmas gift.
• 4 x life insurance.