Data Scientist at Unissant in Washington, DC, USA

Job description

• We are seeking a Data Scientist to join our team in Washington, DC, in support of the Department of Homeland Security (DHS), Immigration and Customs Enforcement (ICE), Law Enforcement Systems and Analysis (LESA) contract within the Strategy and Operations Analysis (SOA) Unit.
• The SOA Unit provides planning, analysis, and technical support spanning the entire Enforcement Lifecycle, delivering advanced analytics, visualization, and modeling capabilities to inform ERO and ICE management decisions at headquarters and field levels, including responses to congressional inquiries and interagency working group collaborations. SOA utilizes advanced analytics, visualization, and business intelligence tools to evaluate operational performance, identify trends, and support data-driven decision-making across ICE/ERO stakeholders.
• The ideal candidate will bring deep Qlik development experience, preferably supporting a federal customer, along with strong data wrangling, ETL, visualization, storytelling, Python or R, SQL, and business-intelligence skills. This role is well suited for a hands-on data scientist who can transform complex datasets into clear analytical products, dashboards, and decision-ready insights for ICE leadership and operational stakeholders.

Responsibilities

• Develop, maintain, and enhance Qlik dashboards, applications, visualizations, data models, and reporting products supporting LESA and SOA mission requirements.
• Perform hands-on data wrangling, extraction, transformation, loading, validation, integration, and quality-review activities across structured, semi-structured, and related operational datasets.
• Develop and maintain ETL processes that acquire, clean, standardize, transform, and prepare data from flat files, data warehouses, operational systems, and approved external sources for analysis and visualization.
• Design and develop clear, accurate, and actionable dashboards, visualizations, reports, and analytical products that communicate data-driven insights to technical and non-technical stakeholders.
• Apply data storytelling techniques to explain trends, patterns, risks, operational performance, and analytical findings in a manner that supports informed ICE/ERO management decisions.
• Write and optimize SQL queries to extract, join, aggregate, validate, and prepare data for Qlik applications, reporting, and analytical use.
• Use Python, R, SQL, Qlik, and other BI or visualization tools to analyze datasets, automate repeatable reporting, and support operational analytics.
• Collaborate with federal stakeholders, data owners, analysts, engineers, and program staff to gather reporting requirements, define data needs, validate results, and deliver usable analytical products.
• Support the documentation of data sources, business rules, data transformations, Qlik application logic, dashboard calculations, reporting processes, and data-quality findings.
• Identify data-quality issues, reporting inconsistencies, data gaps, and opportunities to improve analytical workflows, dashboard usability, and reporting timeliness.
• Support ad hoc analysis, executive briefings, recurring reporting, and special projects as required by the LESA SOA Unit.
• Handle sensitive law-enforcement information in accordance with applicable ICE, DHS, and program security requirements.

Requirements

• Three (3) to ten (10) years of experience in data science, data analytics, business intelligence, visualization, reporting, data engineering, or related analytical disciplines.
• Deep expertise and demonstrated hands-on experience developing Qlik applications, dashboards, data models, visualizations, scripts, calculations, and reporting solutions.
• Experience with Qlik Sense is required; experience with QlikView is preferred.
• Prior Qlik development experience supporting a federal, DHS, ICE, law-enforcement, or similarly regulated client is strongly preferred.
• Experience performing data wrangling, ETL, data profiling, data validation, data integration, data transformation, and data-quality review.
• Strong proficiency in SQL, including complex querying, joins, aggregations, stored procedures, data extraction, and data preparation.
• Proficiency with Python and/or R for data analysis, automation, data cleaning, transformation, and visualization.
• Experience developing visualizations and BI products using Qlik and other tools such as Tableau, Power BI, ArcGIS, matplotlib, seaborn, or equivalent technologies.
• Demonstrated ability to translate complex data and analysis into clear stories, dashboards, reports, briefings, and recommendations for technical and non-technical audiences.
• Familiarity with relational databases, data warehouses, data marts, flat files, and structured or semi-structured datasets.
• Experience working with GitHub, version-control practices, Jupyter Notebooks, or similar development and documentation tools is preferred.
• Experience supporting federal law enforcement, DHS/ICE/ERO, government operations, or other secure/regulated environments is preferred.
• Familiarity with predictive analytics, machine learning, simulation, or geospatial analysis is a plus but is not the primary qualification for this request.
• Strong analytical thinking, problem-solving skills, attention to detail, and ability to manage multiple priorities.
• Ability to work independently and collaboratively in a client-facing, matrixed team environment.
• Bachelor's Degree in Computer Science, Data Science, Statistics, Mathematics, Information Systems, Engineering, Business Analytics, Operations Research, or another related technical field is required.
• Equivalent practical experience may be considered based on client standards.
• Master's Degree in a relevant analytical, technical, or business-intelligence discipline is preferred.
• Excellent verbal and written communication skills, including the ability to explain dashboards, data findings, reporting logic, data-quality issues, and analytical conclusions clearly and effectively.
• Strong visualization and data-storytelling skills, including the ability to produce concise executive-ready dashboards, presentations, and reports.
• Ability to communicate effectively across federal leadership, program stakeholders, technical teams, and business users.
• Must work well in a matrixed team environment.
• Active ICE clearance is required.
• Preference will be given to candidates who are currently cleared or who have held an ICE clearance within the last two years.
• Ability to obtain and maintain the required clearance level is a condition of employment.
• Relevant certifications in Qlik, data analytics, business intelligence, Python, R, SQL, cloud platforms, or data science are preferred.
• Qlik Sense Business Analyst, Qlik Sense Data Architect, Qlik Sense System Administrator, Tableau, Power BI, ArcGIS, AWS, Azure, Google Cloud, Databricks, or similar certifications are a plus.

Skills

Required

• Qlik Sense
• SQL
• Python
• R
• Data wrangling
• ETL
• Data visualization
• Data storytelling
• Business intelligence
• Data modeling
• Data quality review
• Data integration

Preferred

• QlikView
• Tableau
• Power BI
• ArcGIS
• matplotlib
• seaborn
• GitHub
• Version-control practices