Head of Applied Science Growth & Lifecycle

About the role

Zalando Lounge is an off‑price shopping club serving millions of members across Europe. We are looking for a senior applied‑science leader to define and drive the scientific agenda for growth and lifecycle, turning machine‑learning advances into measurable business impact.

Key responsibilities

• Set the research and ML strategy for acquisition, activation, engagement and retention, balancing long‑term scientific advances with near‑term commercial impact.
• Hire, coach and develop applied scientists and scientific leaders, fostering a culture of rigorous peer review and reproducible research.
• Guide problem formulation, method selection and model design across lifetime‑value prediction, causal inference, uplift modelling, personalization and decision optimisation.
• Own the scientific lifecycle from hypothesis through offline evaluation, online experimentation and production deployment, ensuring model quality, latency and maintainability.
• Demonstrate incremental business impact using controlled experiments and causal methods, and communicate results to senior stakeholders.

Required profile

• Proven track record of leading applied‑science or ML teams and delivering impact through others.
• Deep expertise in machine learning, statistics and experimentation, with experience in causal inference, marketing science or optimization.
• Hands‑on experience taking models from research to production in a commercial environment.
• Evidence of measurable business impact from scientific work, including experiment design and interpretation.
• Strong communication skills in English and ability to influence cross‑functional leaders.

Required skills

• Machine learning
• Statistics
• Causal inference
• Experimentation design
• Uplift modelling
• Personalisation techniques
• Decision optimisation

What we offer

• Employee shares programme
• 40% discount on Zalando fashion and beauty products, 30% discount on Zalando Lounge
• 2 paid volunteering days per year
• 27 days of vacation per year (starting)
• Relocation assistance (subject to agreement)
• Family services, health and wellbeing options, mental‑health support
• Access to training platform and bi‑annual peer‑to‑peer review