Have you ever thought about what goes into designing, creating, and running a Zindi Challenge? Do you want a chance to contribute to hundreds of different, real-world AI challenges making a real impact on startups, tech giants and non-profits all over Africa and beyond? You might be Zindi’s next Challenges Lead. We’re looking for someone who knows their way around Python, datasets, and modelling, but also loves to engage with clients and partners, with a passion for running projects effectively, and a knack for creative problem-solving.
About Zindi Zindi is the AI talent and innovation engine connecting 100,000 data scientists and AI developers from across 185+ countries to real-world challenges from governments, NGOs, and top tech companies. Zindi is the trusted source of impactful localised AI solutions and diverse, proven talent. Our vision is to make AI accessible to everyone.
Job Description The Challenges Lead plays a central role in delivering Zindi’s core offering - our AI challenges. This role combines technical expertise in data science and machine learning with client-facing project management and communication skills. You will work closely with challenge hosts (corporates, NGOs, and governments) to design, launch, and manage high-quality, impactful ML challenges on Zindi.
You’ll need to be comfortable discussing complex data problems with clients, envisioning challenge formats that can address the client’s needs, ensuring project requirements are clearly defined and delivered within scope, and managing the full lifecycle of each challenge - from data preparation to evaluation, code review, and solution debrief and handover. In addition, you’ll work closely with the incredible superstars of the Zindi community, coordinating winners’ payments, overseeing code review, and other developer relations tasks.
Client and Project Management
- Serve as a key point of contact for challenge hosts throughout the challenge lifecycle.
- Lead discovery sessions with clients to understand their business goals and translate them into solvable ML problem statements.
- Rapidly conceptualise and iterate on problem statements within the Zindi Challenge framework.
- Manage project timelines, deliverables, and internal coordination to ensure successful, on-time challenge delivery.
- Prepare client-facing reports and presentations summarising outcomes, insights, and implementation recommendations.
Challenge Design and Delivery
- Design engaging and technically sound ML challenges that balance business impact with community engagement.
- Assess and prepare datasets, including sourcing, cleaning, anonymisation, and feature engineering.
- Define appropriate evaluation metrics and ensure the integrity and reproducibility of the challenge setup.
- Oversee platform setup, testing, and launch of challenges on Zindi.
- Monitor challenge activity, engage with participants on the discussion forums, and ensure smooth community experience.
- Evaluate submissions, review winning code, and prepare technical summaries and implementation recommendations for hosts.
Quality, Innovation, and Community Engagement
- Ensure high standards of technical integrity, fairness, and educational value in all challenges.
- Contribute to webinars, blog posts, write-ups, and technical documentation on challenge results and insights.
- Keep track of trends in ML challenges and benchmark against other platforms to continuously improve Zindi’s offering.
- Collaborate with Zindi’s community, marketing, and product teams to improve engagement and platform features.
Core Competencies & Skills
- 3+ years experience in data science, analytics, or machine learning model development.
- Bachelor’s degree in a relevant field.
- Strong programming skills in Python.
- Practical experience with machine learning and predictive modelling, including model evaluation and validation.
- Solid understanding of data preparation, cleaning, and feature engineering.
- Strong grasp of metrics, model evaluation, and challenge-style problem framing.
- Excellent client-facing communication skills - able to discuss technical problems with clarity and empathy.
- Proven ability to manage multiple projects and stakeholders simultaneously.
- Excellent written and verbal communication skills.
- Passion for building the AI ecosystem in Africa and supporting the next generation of AI practitioners.
Desirable Skills & Experience
- Master’s degree in a quantitative discipline (e.g., Mathematics, Computer Science, Engineering, Physics).
- Consulting or client-facing experience, especially managing technical or data-driven projects.
- Experience working with diverse data types — satellite, GIS, imagery, audio, or text.
- Experience with data visualisation and communicating data-driven insights.
- Familiarity with IT environments, data governance, and project delivery frameworks.
Interested candidates to please reach out to zindi@zindi.africa (use subject line: Challenges Lead and attach your CV). If you have not received a reply within 10 working days please deem your application as unsuccessful.
This position was originally posted by Zindi and has been curated by PurposePhil Career. To apply, please visit the original listing on the "apply" link below. We are not affiliated with the employer organization of this job ad or consultancy, and provide this curated listing as a service to our users.