Contract Principal Data Scientist Jobs (NOW HIRING)

Position Summary...About the Role
We are looking for a Principal Data Scientist to lead high-impact initiatives within Walmart’s Decision Science organization. This role is centered on building scalable, end-to-end Data Science and AI solutions that improve customer experience, optimize operational and sourcing decisions, and drive measurable business impact across the enterprise.
As a senior technical leader, you will partner closely with business, product, engineering, and operations teams throughout the entire lifecycle of a solution — from problem formulation and opportunity identification to model development, experimentation, deployment, and impact measurement. You will help define success metrics, design rigorous experiments, develop scalable AI/ML systems, and influence strategic decision-making through data-driven insights and innovation.
Our team is deeply customer-focused and works on some of the most critical challenges in retail and supply chain, building intelligent systems that improve item availability, enable smarter sourcing and inventory decisions, optimize operational efficiency, and ultimately enhance the end-to-end customer experience. We are investing heavily in GenAI-powered capabilities that improve business insights, accelerate decision-making, and enhance stakeholder productivity through intelligent analytics, conversational experiences, and AI-assisted workflows.
You will play a key role in shaping the long-term data science and AI vision of Walmart, driving innovation across both traditional ML and GenAI applications, and raising the technical bar across the organization. What you'll do...What You'll Do
Strategic Leadership

• Define and drive the Data science roadmap aligned with Decision Science priorities.
• Partner closely with business, product, engineering, and operations teams to identify high-impact opportunities and translate them into scalable ML and AI solutions.
• Influence executive stakeholders through data-driven insights, strategic recommendations, and thought leadership.
• Translate ambiguous business challenges into structured analytical frameworks, measurable success metrics, and actionable roadmaps.
• Drive end-to-end ownership from problem formulation through experimentation, deployment, and post-launch impact measurement.

Technical Excellence

• Design, develop, and deploy end-to-end ML and data science products, including problem framing, feature engineering, model development, experimentation, deployment, and measurement on business metrics.
• Develop and deploy production-grade GenAI solutions using modern LLMs and agent orchestration frameworks, including prompt engineering, tool integration, skills and retrieval-based workflows, to improve business insights, automate operational workflows, and enhance decision-making.
• Define and track meaningful success metrics aligned with customer experience and operational goals.
• Develop scalable pipelines and production-ready solutions in partnership with engineering teams.
• Ensure model quality, explainability, monitoring, and operational excellence.

Qualifications

• Master’s degree or PhD in Computer Science, Statistics, Mathematics, Economics, Operations Research, Data Science, or a related quantitative field.
• 10+ years of experience in Data Science, Machine Learning, Advanced Analytics, or related disciplines, with a proven track record of leading large-scale, high-impact initiatives.
• Strong expertise in statistical modeling, machine learning, experimentation, causal inference, and data science methodologies.
• Experience building and deploying scalable machine learning solutions and AI-powered applications in production environments.
• Hands-on experience developing GenAI solutions using Large Language Models (LLMs), prompt engineering, retrieval-augmented generation (RAG), Skills, vector databases, and agentic workflows.
• Experience with cloud AI/ML platforms and modern AI tooling ecosystems, preferably on GCP or Azure.
• Experience with distributed data processing frameworks such as Spark and large-scale data platforms.
• Experience with MLOps and LLMOps practices, including feature stores, model monitoring, evaluation frameworks, and production ML systems.
• Experience working in large-scale enterprise environments, preferably in retail, eCommerce, marketplace, supply chain, consumer technology, fintech, or other data-intensive industries.
• Strong communication, storytelling, and stakeholder management skills, including the ability to influence executive-level decision-making.
• Demonstrated ability to translate ambiguous business problems into scalable data science and AI solutions that drive measurable business outcomes.

At Walmart, we offer competitive pay as well as performance-based bonus awards and other great benefits for a happier mind, body, and wallet. Health benefits include medical, vision and dental coverage. Financial benefits include 401(k), stock purchase and company-paid life insurance. Paid time off benefits include PTO (including sick leave), parental leave, family care leave, bereavement, jury duty, and voting. Other benefits include short-term and long-term disability, company discounts, Military Leave Pay, adoption and surrogacy expense reimbursement, and more. You will also receive PTO and/or PPTO that can be used for vacation, sick leave, holidays, or other purposes. The amount you receive depends on your job classification and length of employment. It will meet or exceed the requirements of paid sick leave laws, where applicable. For information about PTO, see https://one.walmart.com/notices. Live Better U is a Walmart-paid education benefit program for full-time and part-time associates in Walmart and Sam's Club facilities. Programs range from high school completion to bachelor's degrees, including English Language Learning and short-form certificates. Tuition, books, and fees are completely paid for by Walmart.
Eligibility requirements apply to some benefits and may depend on your job classification and length of employment. Benefits are subject to change and may be subject to a specific plan or program terms.
For information about benefits and eligibility, see One.Walmart.
The annual salary range for this position is $110,000.00 - $220,000.00 Additional compensation includes annual or quarterly performance bonuses. Additional compensation for certain positions may also include :
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Minimum Qualifications...

Outlined below are the required minimum qualifications for this position. If none are listed, there are no minimum qualifications.

Option 1: Bachelors degree in Statistics, Economics, Analytics, Mathematics, Computer Science, Information Technology or related field and 5 years' experience in an analytics related field. Option 2: Masters degree in Statistics, Economics, Analytics, Mathematics, Computer Science, Information Technology or related field and 3 years' experience in an analytics related field. Option 3: 7 years' experience in an analytics or related field Preferred Qualifications...

Outlined below are the optional preferred qualifications for this position. If none are listed, there are no preferred qualifications.

Data science, machine learning, optimization models, PhD in Machine Learning, Computer Science, Information Technology, Operations Research, Statistics, Applied Mathematics, Econometrics, Publications or active peer reviewer in related journals or conference, Successful completion of one or more assessments in Python, Spark, Scala, or R, Using open source frameworks (for example, scikit learn, tensorflow, torch), We value candidates with a background in creating inclusive digital experiences, demonstrating knowledge in implementing Web Content Accessibility Guidelines (WCAG) 2.2 AA standards, assistive technologies, and integrating digital accessibility seamlessly. The ideal candidate would have knowledge of accessibility best practices and join us as we continue to create accessible products and services following Walmart’s accessibility standards and guidelines for supporting an inclusive culture. Primary Location... 702 Sw 8Th St, Bentonville, AR 72716, United States of America Walmart and its subsidiaries are committed to maintaining a drug-free workplace and has a no tolerance policy regarding the use of illegal drugs and alcohol on the job. This policy applies to all employees and aims to create a safe and productive work environment.