Staff Data Scientist at John Deere
Austin, TX
$123,804–$185,700from the description
Jun 29, 2026
Austin, TX
Jul 21, 2026
What this job asks for AI summary
A senior individual-contributor data science role focused on building and maintaining production-grade machine learning, statistical, and causal inference systems against large agricultural and operational datasets. The position involves leading projects end-to-end — from problem framing through deployment and monitoring — while mentoring other data scientists and coordinating across product, engineering, and domain-expert teams. It suits an experienced practitioner comfortable working independently on ambiguous problems and communicating technical tradeoffs to mixed audiences.
Senior level · 5+ years · Austin-Round Rock-Georgetown, TX · Full-time
Advertised as Staff, but the requirements read as Senior.
“or” means any one of them counts — you don't need all of them.
We read this from the posting text with AI. Skim the description below before ruling yourself out.
How this req sits in the market our data
Roughly 75 people in the Austin-Round Rock-Georgetown, TX area plausibly meet what this posting asks for (data scientists). range 45–110
Applicant volume Moderate — A normal amount of company. The rare requirements below are what will separate a shortlisted application from the rest.
Most people in this occupation already list these. Still required — just not what gets you shortlisted.
What the occupation pays Median $130,161 (middle half $87,666–$165,113). This posting is about at that midpoint.
Estimated from BLS employment for this occupation and area, per-skill prevalence across our listing corpus, and published wage benchmarks — as of Jul 28, 2026. It is a model, not a headcount.
Why we read it this way (9)
The role is titled 'Staff Data Scientist' but the actual requirements — 5+ years of experience, 1+ year of technical leadership, and independent delivery on multiple projects — are consistent with a Senior-level role rather than a true Staff-level position (which typically implies cross-team technical authority). The 'Staff' title appears to be John Deere's internal leveling convention rather than a reflection of org-wide scope.
Primary location is Austin, TX; Urbandale, IA is listed as an equally valid onsite location. The Austin CBSA is used as the primary metro since it is listed first and is the posting's stated primary location.
The role is listed as onsite, but the posting notes remote may be considered for strong candidates — remote is not the default and is not guaranteed, so remote is flagged false.
An advanced degree (Master's or PhD) is listed as preferred, not required; equivalent experience is implicitly accepted given the 5+ years requirement framing, so the degree requirement is set to None.
Spark and Databricks are listed together as a required large-scale data platform pair; both are emitted as separate required skills with each as an alternative for the other, since the JD treats them as interchangeable options ('Spark, Databricks, or similar').
Geospatial tools (GeoPandas, H3, Rasterio, GDAL, QGIS, ArcGIS) appear under 'What Makes You Stand Out' (preferred/nice-to-have section); they are emitted as a single preferred skill with alternatives.
Sequence modeling, GenAI/RAG/vector databases, CI/CD, and feature stores all appear under 'What Makes You Stand Out' and are marked preferred accordingly.
VISA sponsorship is explicitly not available for this position.
Ignored 1 non-technology phrase(s) as skills (responsibilities/concepts, not named tools): sequence modeling.
Read the full posting
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