Dr. Data Science & Perfor

Real Salt Lake, Utah Royals FC, Real Monarchs, and the RSL Academy are united by a shared mission of winning together through development. We are committed to building world-class teams by investing in people—developing players, staff, and leaders through collaboration, innovation, and a high-performance culture. If you’re passionate about sport, science, and leadership, we invite you to grow your career with Utah Soccer.

Summary:

The Director of Data Science & Performance Innovation leads a fully integrated high-performance data and sports science function across MLS, NWSL, MLS NEXT Pro, and Academy pathways. This role oversees all sports science operations, performance analytics, applied biomechanics, and data infrastructure, ensuring alignment of methodology, technology systems, and reporting standards across the organization.

This position plays a critical role in supporting player availability, long-term development, and evidence-based decision-making by unifying performance data, monitoring practices, and return-to-play frameworks across men’s, women’s, and youth programs.

The ideal candidate is a strategic leader with deep applied experience who can translate complex performance data into actionable insights while building scalable systems and developing high-performing staff.

Responsibilities Include:

• Lead and implement a club‑wide data science and performance innovation strategy across Real Salt Lake, Utah Royals FC, Real Monarchs, and the RSL Academy, ensuring vertical alignment across MLS, NWSL, Next Pro, and Academy pathways.
• Establish standardized methodologies for physical monitoring, testing protocols, biomechanics assessments, data collection, and reporting across all teams.
• Oversee all sports science operations, including GPS/optical tracking, heart‑rate monitoring, force plates, neuromuscular diagnostics, and speed‑power testing, ensuring high‑quality data and actionable insights.
• Provide applied biomechanics leadership, supporting movement analysis, asymmetry profiling, deceleration mechanics, and sport‑specific performance optimization across men’s, women’s, and youth athletes.
• Design and maintain a centralized performance data infrastructure, overseeing data ingestion, cleaning, storage, and integration to ensure data integrity and accessibility.
• Direct performance analytics and reporting, including dashboard development, benchmarking, workload modelling, longitudinal tracking, and applied machine learning initiatives.
• Collaborate closely with medical and reconditioning teams to implement unified return‑to‑train and return‑to‑play (RTP) frameworks informed by biomechanical, readiness, and exposure data.
• Translate complex data and scientific insights into clear, actionable decision support for coaches, medical staff, sporting leadership, and executives.
• Lead, mentor, and develop sports science and performance analytics staff, including performance reviews, professional development planning, and seasonal staffing alignment.
• Facilitate cross‑department collaboration, ensuring alignment between sports science, strength & conditioning, medical, coaching, and technical leadership.
• Evaluate and integrate emerging technologies and research, driving continuous improvement and innovation across all performance environments.
• Promote knowledge sharing and best practices across teams, ensuring insights from MLS, NWSL, Next Pro, and Academy environments elevate the entire organization.
• Perform other duties as assigned.

Minimum Qualifications:

• Bachelor’s degree in Exercise Science, Sports Science, Data Science, Biomechanics, or a related field.
• Minimum of 5 years of applied experience in elite football or comparable high‑performance environments.
• Advanced proficiency in R, Python, SQL, and data visualization platforms (Power BI, Tableau, Looker, or similar).
• Extensive experience with GPS/optical tracking, heart‑rate monitoring, force plates, neuromuscular diagnostics, and speed profiling.
• Strong applied biomechanics expertise.
• Demonstrated experience leading and managing multi‑team or multi‑disciplinary performance staff.
• Exceptional communication skills with the ability to present complex information…