Senior Data Scientist (contingent)

Intro

MO helps government leaders achieve their mission by designing intuitive and sustainable customer experiences that build trust and improve satisfaction. We use human-centered design to modernize and transform customer and employee experiences. We’re a small team of interdisciplinary creatives with mission, impact, and service to others deeply rooted in our DNA. We’re naive enough to believe we can change the world and bold enough to take the chance to do it.

We combine design thinking with agile delivery methods to drive visionary, human-centered products to market. Our custom solutions range in size from completely revamping an entire application to refreshing small pieces of a larger product. Everyone at MO directly impacts the direction and success of the company, and we own our roles. We value integrity, curiosity, courage, and excellence, fostering a culture of accountability and collaboration while continuously challenging each other to grow and improve. At MO, we delight in creating products and experiences that improve lives.

Overview

Are you looking to make an impact? We’re seeking a Senior Data Scientist with a systems and product measurement mindset to support our client at the U.S. Department of Veterans Affairs (VA). Through your design and technical expertise, you’ll help reduce barriers to care and benefits—improving the lives of Veterans, Caregivers, Survivors, and Family Members.

We’re looking for someone with strong analytical skills, a sharp eye for patterns in complex data, and a talent for turning insights into action. This role is ideal for individuals who excel at building measurement frameworks, visualizing systems, and delivering data narratives that inform decision-making. If you’re experienced in making sense of complex service environments, refining measurement models, and creating tools that support leaders, we encourage you to apply.

In this role, you’ll collaborate with service designers, product managers, and fellow data professionals to enhance existing data sources, close information gaps, and ensure VA’s transformation efforts are measurable and evidence-based. You’ll analyze operational and survey data, apply techniques like NLP and AI, and develop tailored artifacts—dashboards, diagrams, and interactive tools—that surface key insights and support strategic planning.

How will you spend your time? 85% of your time will be dedicated to billable work, with the remaining 15% focused on growing our data practice at MO, contributing to our culture, and supporting business development.

What makes a successful candidate? You have a track record as a capability leader on high-performing teams. You thrive in ambiguity, build systems from the ground up, and lead through influence in matrixed environments. Experience in client services (e.g., consulting or digital agencies) is helpful but not required. A passion for our mission and civic design is essential.

• As a Senior Data Scientist at MO, you’ll lead data strategy and insight generation to inform and improve Veteran-facing services. Your work will directly support decision-makers across the VA.  Responsibilities include: 
• Measurement Strategy Development: Develop and iterate measurement strategies to track changes in system effectiveness and efficiency over time, ensuring alignment with CX frameworks and VA-wide performance goals. Partner with service designers to co-create measurement approaches grounded in user journeys and service blueprints.
• Data Analysis and Insight Generation: Analyze and synthesize quantitative and qualitative data to produce holistic views of service performance, product experience, and Veteran impact. Conduct advanced analysis using techniques such as outcome metric development, NLP, and AI to extract insights from operational and survey data within the VA ecosystem.
• Insightful Communication and Visualization: Create clear, actionable data artifacts—such as dashboards, reports, diagrams, and interactive tools—to support strategic planning and decision-making across VA leadership and product teams.
• Stakeholder and Client Management: Engage stakeholders and cross-functional teams to understand their information needs, identify data gaps, and co-develop strategies to improve data quality and completeness. Collaborate closely to design tailored solutions—such as visualizations and insights—that support decision-making, illuminate pain points, and uncover opportunities to enhance Veteran and stakeholder experiences.

• Professional Curiosity: Keep abreast of the latest developments in data science; bring good practices into a constrained technical and policy environment – with a strong commitment to accessibility.
• Mentorship and Design Leadership: Work with the MO capability teams to advance how human-centered design (HCD) integrates data in strategic storytelling. Provide mentorship to more junior designers to foster their growth and development.

• Design-Integrated Thinking: You understand how data supports product and service design, and you’re excited to co-create measurement frameworks. You can make sense of messy systems and help teams define meaningful, measurable outcomes.
• Data Science Mastery: You apply advanced analytical and statistical methods to extract insights from complex, often unstructured data. Skilled in tools like Python/R/SQL, HTML/CSS, PowerBI, or D3/Observable, you build reliable models, scalable pipelines, and meaningful metrics, and easy to understand data visualizations that drive decision-making. You balance technical rigor with practical impact, ensuring insights are accurate, actionable, and aligned with stakeholder goals.
• People-centric Advocacy: Demonstrated commitment to social impact design. Experience as a people (customer/user) advocate and a nuanced understanding of the challenges posed in the public sector.Experience surfacing variation in experiences and outcomes, helping teams understand where users face barriers, delays, or inefficiencies—and supporting efforts to improve service access, responsiveness, and reach.
• Consultative Mindset: Skilled in understanding client expectations, working as an agile team, managing and prioritizing multiple high-profile, medium-to-high complexity projects, and ensuring accountability in delivering against customer needs.You know how to tell a story with data. You can shape findings into narratives that resonate with product teams, executives, and partners—helping drive alignment, uncover insights, and inspire action.
• Cross-Disciplinary System Implementation: Experience working with cross-functional teams of product managers, developers and service designers to ensure the successful adoption of deliverables, maintaining consistency and accessibility across civic tech products.

• A fun, dynamic working environment with an energetic and diverse team
• A REMOTE first work environment
• Competitive compensation commensurate with experience
• Opportunities for career growth
• Full health benefits (85% medical premiums for employees and dependents, dental, vision)
• 401K plan
• Unlimited Paid Time Off (PTO)
• Short- and Long-Term Disability in addition to Life Insurance (company sponsored)

Note: to ensure we remain compliant with all state, county, and local employment and tax regulations, applicants must currently reside in one of the following states to be considered for employment with MO. This list will be updated periodically as our PeopleOps team works to open up hiring in additional states.

AL, AZ, CA, CO, CT, DC, FL, GA, IL, KS, ME, MD, MA, MI, NC, NV, NY, OR, VA, WA

We're MO

The Company reserves the right to conduct background and/or reference checks on all prospective employees. Your job offer is contingent upon satisfactory completion of such background and/or reference check as applicable. Additionally, this position may require a government background investigation to be completed and adjudicated dependent on your role and project . This offer will be withdrawn if any of the above conditions are not satisfied.

In support of the  Colorado Equal Pay Transparency Act, and others like it across the country, MO job descriptions feature the starting range we reasonably expect to pay to candidates who would join our team with little to no need for training on the responsibilities we've outlined above. Actual compensation is influenced by a wide range of factors including but not limited to skill set, level of experience, and responsibility.