Senior Consultant - AI & Data Science

Role Overview

Want to build the AI solutions that make smart cities truly intelligent? Your expertise might just make you our new AI & Data Science Expert. Here at Buro Happold, expect the exceptional. From the projects you will work on to the clients we work with, from career‑defining opportunities to an inclusive and diverse practice where we all contribute to a more equitable world.

From our reputation to our relationships, wherever your Buro Happold career takes you, it’ll be anything but ordinary.

We are seeking an experienced AI & Data Science Expert to design, build, and deploy advanced analytics and machine learning solutions that generate measurable value for the business. The role focuses on end‑to‑end ownership of use cases: from problem framing and data exploration, through model development and validation, to deployment, monitoring, and continuous improvement. The AI & Data Science Expert will work closely with business stakeholders, product teams, and technology functions to translate complex data into actionable insights and scalable AI products.

• Engage with stakeholders to understand business challenges and translate them into well‑defined AI and data science use cases.
• Collect, clean, and engineer data from multiple sources (structured and unstructured) to create robust feature sets for modelling.
• Develop, validate, and optimize machine learning and statistical models (e.g., classification, regression, forecasting, clustering, recommendation).
• Build and maintain production‑grade pipelines for model training, deployment, and monitoring in collaboration with data engineering and IT teams.
• Design and implement experiments, A/B tests, and performance evaluation frameworks to quantify model impact.
• Communicate findings and recommendations clearly through dashboards, visualisations, and presentations tailored to technical and non‑technical audiences.
• Contribute to the development of AI standards, best practices, and reusable components (feature stores, model templates, evaluation frameworks).
• Stay current with advances in AI/ML, data science tools, and MLOps practices, and assess their relevance for the organisation.

• Minimum 5 years of hands‑on experience in data science / machine learning roles, delivering production‑ready solutions.
• Solid experience with supervised and unsupervised learning techniques, model evaluation, feature engineering, and hyperparameter tuning.
• Practical experience working with SQL and relational databases; familiarity with big data or cloud data platforms is an advantage.
• Experience building end‑to‑end workflows from data ingestion to model deployment, ideally with exposure to MLOps tools and practices.
• Strong analytical and problem‑solving skills, with the ability to structure ambiguous problems and work with imperfect data.
• Proven ability to explain complex concepts clearly to non‑technical stakeholders and to influence data‑driven decisions.

• Bachelor’s or Master’s degree in Computer Science
• Data Science
• Statistics
• Mathematics
• Engineering
• A related quantitative discipline or equivalent relevant experience.

• Highly organised, detail oriented, and rigorous in approach to data and schedule integrity.
• Proactive and solution driven, with a strong sense of ownership for deadlines and deliverables.
• Collaborative team player, comfortable working with multidisciplinary and multicultural teams.
• Able to work under pressure, manage multiple priorities, and adapt to evolving project needs.

• Hybrid working arrangements.
• Attractive salary and benefits package.
• A strong commitment to your continuous development with a learning and development programme.
• Entitlement to two memberships to professional bodies or subscriptions.
• An international culture that wherever your career takes you at Buro Happold, you won’t be far from the exceptional.
• At Buro Happold, everyone else’s extraordinary is just our everyday.

We welcome applications from those who are seeking flexibility in their careers. Our exceptional portfolio of projects is the result of the diversity of thought, identities, backgrounds and experiences that shape us. Appreciating each other’s differences is key; we want employees to feel they don’t have to mask elements of their identity to thrive. We are working to change the lack of representation of marginalised groups in the built environment and are particularly keen to hear from anyone who feels they are underrepresented in the industry.

We have much to learn from one another. Embracing difference allows us to develop the most innovative and elegant solutions.