Actuarial Data Science Lead

WHAT WE DO

Shepherd is an AI-native commercial insurance platform transforming how high-hazard industries get covered. Our mission is to make risk frictionless for the builders and operators shaping the physical world — protecting progress from concept through construction and into decades of operation.

The infrastructure behind the AI boom — data centers, semiconductor fabs, renewable energy assets — has to be built and insured. But traditional carriers weren't built for this speed:

• Complex commercial construction projects routinely wait weeks for a single quote
• Legacy carriers rely on static applications and disconnected systems
• Brokers chase carriers through calls, emails, and resubmissions

We built Shepherd to solve that. Our AI performs the same underwriting workflows in seconds, and integrates real-time data from construction technology partners — Procore, Autodesk, OpenSpace, DroneDeploy, and others — to see risk as it actually exists, not just as it was reported on a static form.

We're pursuing the most ambitious technical vision in commercial insurance: fully autonomous underwriting. We're closing in on the first fully agentic submission in the industry — email in, price out, no human intervention until the last mile.

With Shepherd, safety, speed, and quality no longer trade off against one another — they compound. We're building:

• Faster decisions
• Smarter, more accurate pricing
• Better risk outcomes for insureds who invest in safer practices

We're not just modernizing insurance products. We're building the risk infrastructure for the next generation of financial services.

OUR INVESTORS

In March 2026, Shepherd raised a $42M Series B https://www.linkedin.com/posts/justindlevine29_today-were-announcing-our-42m-series-b-activity-7442200922291630080-z1gw?rcm=ACoAAAkOMEwBRnAAXmdnQcaOJeioCu6VCqR6Gzc&utm_medium=member_desktop&utm_source=share — bringing total funding to over $60M — led by Intact Private Capital, the investment arm of one of the largest insurers in the world. Intact is not only our lead investor but also a carrier partner, a testament to the confidence the incumbent industry has in what we're building. Our investors:

• Intact Private Capital https://www.intactfc.com/about-us/intact-ventures
• Spark Capital https://www.sparkcapital.com/
• Costanoa Ventures https://costanoa.vc/
• Y Combinator https://www.ycombinator.com/
• Susa Ventures https://www.susaventures.com/
• And several others

OUR TEAM

We're a team of technologists and insurance enthusiasts, bridging the two worlds together. Check out our About https://www.shepherdinsurance.com/about page to learn more.

ABOUT THE ROLE

Shepherd is building the data infrastructure and predictive models that power modern commercial insurance. As an Actuarial Data Science Lead on the Actuarial & Predictive Analytics team, you will own the development of pricing models starting with commercial auto, one of our highest-volume and most data-rich lines. You'll directly shape the quality of the book we write and the products we bring to market.

This is a high-impact, individual-contributor role for someone who thrives at the intersection of statistical rigor and shipping real products. You will work closely with actuaries, underwriters, and engineers to turn data into decisions.

WHAT YOU'LL DO

• Own commercial auto pricing models end-to-end from feature development through deployment and iterate on them as the book grows and new data sources come online
• Build and deploy predictive models build and deploy loss cost models that set pricing for Shepherd's commercial auto book
• Design and maintain feature pipelines that transform raw submission, claims, and third-party data into model-ready inputs
• Collaborate with actuaries and underwriters to translate domain expertise into model features and validate outputs against real-world outcomes
• Develop model monitoring frameworks to track drift, performance degradation, and calibration over time
• Run experiments and back-tests to quantify model impact on loss ratios, pricing accuracy, and portfolio quality
• Communicate findings clearly to technical and non-technical stakeholders through concise documentation and presentations

WHAT WE'RE LOOKING FOR

Must-Haves

• 7+ years of professional experience building and deploying personal auto or commercial lines predictive pricing models in production
• Familiarity with actuarial concepts (loss development, exposure rating, credibility)
• Strong foundation in statistics: GLMs, GBDTs, time series analysis, heavy tail distributions, and Bayesian methods
• Proficiency in Python and SQL
• ACAS/FCAS actuarial designation
• Experience with feature engineering on messy, real-world, small data
• Ability to reason from first principles and communicate results crisply to non-technical audiences
• AI-native mindset: you already use LLMs and AI tools to accelerate your own work
• Experience managing a small team or project

Nice-to-Haves

• Experience in insurance, insurtech, fintech, or other regulated industries
• Exposure to telematics pricing models
• Experience with NLP/document extraction from unstructured insurance submissions
• Prior work with model deployment infrastructure (AWS)

BENEFITS

🏥 Premium Healthcare

100% contribution to top-tier health, dental, and vision

🥕 Fertility benefits and family building support

🏖️ Unlimited PTO

Flexibility to take the time off, recharge, and perform

🥗 Daily lunches, dinners, and snacks

We work together, and enjoy meals together too

🖥️ SF, NYC, Dallas-Fort Worth, Chicago and LA Offices

📚 Professional Development

Access to premium coaching, including leadership development

🏦 Competitive 401(k) Plan

🐶 Dog-friendly office

Plenty of dogs to play with and make friends with in the SF office