Principal Data Scientist (Operations) - 90339320 - Washington

Your success is a train ride away!

As we move America’s workforce toward the future, Amtrak connects businesses and communities across the country. We employ more than 20,000 diverse, energetic professionals in a variety of career fields throughout the United States. The safety of our passengers, our employees, the public and our operating environment is our priority, and the success of our railroad is due to our employees.

Are you ready to join our team?

Our values of ‘Do the Right Thing, Excel Together and Put Customers First’ are at the heart of what matters most to us, and our Core Capabilities, ‘Building Trust, Accountability, Effective Communication, Customer Focus, and Proactive Safety & Security’ are what every employee needs to know and do to be most impactful at Amtrak. By living the Amtrak values, focusing on our capabilities, and actively embracing and fostering diverse ideas, backgrounds, and perspectives, together we will honor our past and make Amtrak a company of the future.

Job Summary

As Principal Data Scientist, you will lead the design and delivery of machine learning and analytics solutions that improve how Amtrak runs its railroad. Working alongside operating and engineering teams, you will turn real operational problems into models, tools, and decisions that reach the field, and you will help set the standards that make our data science practice repeatable and effective.

Essential Functions

• Formulates and leads guided, multifaceted analytic studies against large volumes of data.
• Interprets and analyzes data using exploratory mathematic and statistical techniques based on the scientific method.
• Coordinates research and analytic activities utilizing various data points (unstructured and structured) and employ programming to clean, massage, and organize the data.
• Works closely with all business units and engineering teams to develop strategy for long term data platform architecture.
• Leads all data experiments.

Minimum Qualifications

• Bachelor’s Degree or equivalent combination of education, training and/or relevant experience.
• Plus 7 years of relevant work experience.
• Strong Python and SQL experience.
• Hands-on experience building, deploying, and maintaining models and data pipelines in Databricks or a comparable lakehouse platform (Spark, Delta, MLflow).

Preferred Qualifications

• Bachelor’s Degree or equivalent combination of education, training and/or relevant experience.
• Plus 9 years of relevant work experience.
• Cloud experience (AWS or Azure).
• Experience embedding with business or operations teams to deliver solutions in their workflow.
• Familiarity with modern ML and AI tooling.
• Backgorund in operations, transporation, or another data-rich physical industry.

Knowledge, Skills, and Abilities

• Requires an advanced analytical knowledge of data.
• Ability to conduct large data analysis.
• Ability to perform data conditioning for storage/moving capability.
• Ability to program advanced computing.
• Ability to develop algorithms, software and data models.
• Ability to execute predictive analytics.

The salary/hourly range is $124,600.00 – $161,352.00. Pay is based on several factors including but not limited to education, work experience, certifications, etc. Depending on an employee’s assigned worksite or location, Amtrak may consider a geo-pay differential to be applied to the employee’s base salary. Amtrak may offer additional incentive and pay programs to recognize and reward our employees, including a short-term incentive bonus based upon factors such as individual and company performance that is commensurate with the level of the position.

Health and Wellbeing

Financial and Retirement

Work and Family Life Support

Health, Dental, and Vision Insurance

401K with Employer Match

Generous Paid Time Off

Wellness Programs

Railroad Retirement Benefits

Paid Caregiving Days and Backup Care

Health Savings Account

Public Service Student Loan Forgiveness

Fertility and Family Building Benefits

No-cost Personal Health Advocate

Student Loan Assistance

Adoption and Surrogacy Assistance

Medical Plan Opt-out Credit

Tuition and Education Reimbursement

Paid Family Leave

Life Insurance

Rail Pass Privileges

Short- and Long-term Disability Insurance

Employee Assistance Program

No-cost Financial Advisor Sessions

Commuter and Flexible Spending Accounts

Learn more about our benefits offerings here.

Requisition ID:166662

Work Arrangement:06-Onsite 4/5 Days Click here for more information about work arrangements at Amtrak.

Relocation Offered:No

Travel Requirements:Up to 25%

You power our progress through your performance.

We want your work at Amtrak to be more than a job. We want your career at Amtrak to be a fulfilling experience where you find challenging work, rewarding opportunities, respect among colleagues, and attractive compensation. Amtrak maintains a culture that values high performance and recognizes individual employee contributions.

Amtrak is committed to a safe workplace free of drugs and alcohol. All Amtrak positions requires a pre-employment background check that includes prior employment verification, a criminal history check and a pre-employment drug screen.

Candidates who test positive for marijuana will be disqualified, regardless of any state or local statute, ordinance, regulation, or other law that legalizes or decriminalizes the use or possession of marijuana, whether for medical, recreational, or other use. Amtrak's pre-employment drug testing program is administered in accordance with DOT regulations and applicable law.

In accordance with DOT regulations (49 CFR § 40.25), Amtrak is required to obtain prior drug and alcohol testing records for applicants/employees intending to perform safety-sensitive duties for covered Department of Transportation positions. If an applicant/employee refuses to provide written consent for Amtrak to obtain these records, the individual will not be permitted to perform safety-sensitive functions.

In accordance with federal law governing security checks of covered individuals for providers of public transportation (Title 6 U.S.C. §1143), Amtrak is required to screen applicants for any permanent or interim disqualifying criminal offenses.

Note that any education requirement listed above may be deemed satisfied if you have an equivalent combination of education, training and experience.

Amtrak is an equal opportunity employer and all qualified applicants will receive consideration for employment without regard to race/color, to include traits historically associated with race, including but not limited to, hair texture and hairstyles such as braids, locks and twists, religion, sex (including pregnancy, childbirth and related conditions, such as lactation), national origin/ethnicity, disability (intellectual, mental and physical), veteran status, marital status, ancestry, sexual orientation, gender identity and gender expression, genetic information, citizenship or any other personal characteristics protected by law.