Data Science

Title: Africa Data Science & Engineering Internship

Location: Africa (La-Lucia Ridge Durban/Sandton)

Duration : 24 mont

CONTEXT:
Unilever (UL) is driving digital transformation deliver 4G growth. Our mission is to transform our organization to a digital first culture, delivered by a world-class data and insights team, leaping ahead of our competition in everything we do.

UL’s D&A Market teams will lead the path for UL to become data-intelligent. The team will do this by delivering advanced products at scale, enabling UL functions, UniOps and leadership teams to turn data into insights, actions and decisions at a faster pace than ever before to achieve competitive edge for UL.

Each Market team consisting of technical (data engineering and science) expertise as well as functional business insight generation expertise (e.g. Finance, CMI, CD) will work with other Market teams and the D&A Global team to ensure that insights discovered locally are joined up and enhanced with regional/globally-discovered or researched insights to enable joined-up recommendations and decisions aimed at driving incremental growth by meeting the needs of our consumers, customers and employees.

With the ULE looking to D&A Market teams to power the exponential growth of UL in an in increasingly VUCA (volatile, uncertain, complex and ambiguous) context, it is imperative that D&A Market teams are organised to be highly adaptive and flexible to demand, fast-changing priorities and emergent opportunities. To do this, it will be important for the D&A Market team to have an agile mindset, org structure and ways of working (beyond agile tools and techniques) - i.e. able to embrace uncertainty, ambiguity, and to create structure out of chaos.

There are five major themes in the Data and Analytics global strategy that will relate to the work of D&A Market teams:
TEAM’S RESPONSIBILITIES:
The Unilever Africa Data and Analytics team is a multi-disciplinary team that consists of actuaries, accountants, mathematicians, data scientists, engineers, economists, statisticians and other specialists who provide unique insights and expertise to our business across the business groups. Using our diverse skill sets we create value for our business stakeholders through the development of innovative solutions using advanced analytical modelling (ML & AI), robotic process automation as well as finance, customer and marketing analytics. Our team leverages a wide range of technologies and platforms to best meet the specific needs of each of our business groups and functions. Our team is collaborative and engaging and always looking for driven and high-achieving individuals.

This team is responsible for managing the market’s demand for data, analytics, and insights. It is also responsible for streamlining in-scope processes related to data analytics and insights generation in the market, through automating, consolidating and eliminating them where appropriate to deliver a seamless, fast insights-generation experience using tooling provided by the Global D&A team.

MAIN JOB PURPOSE:
Data is the backbone of our organisation, and they're the team who are driving our transformation into a future-ready data intelligent business. So, it's an especially exciting time to join this Internship programme. Fast moving consumer goods sectors (FMCG) are fast-converging sectors. And here in the data analytics segment of the organisation, we’re leading the charge - by evolving our workplaces and people to meet rapidly changing business and customer needs. There is the large incoherence in the demand for data science and engineering skills verses the supply of skills of it across the continent. As a FMCG company our competitors are no longer just other FMCG organisations, these now include Start -up’s who offer more attractive, flexible “gig” type work. The attraction and retention of data science and engineering skills is also a prevalent challenge we face. For these reasons building constant skills pipeline becomes “a must do.”

We're set to become a 100-year-old 'start-up', as we combine our innovative agility with the benefits of our respected African heritage, clear purpose, and established brand. It's an exhilarating time to work here - and we're leading the pack by implementing real and relevant changes to meet our people, business, and customer needs. We have a very dynamic culture one with a steep initial learning curve, tailored for individuals who want to augment their data science and engineering skills with core business skills as well. We are passionate about Africa as our home and our ability and responsibility to drive her growth.

This 24-month Internship programme offers a transformative journey - as we work to future-proof our team’s skills and capabilities, while meeting world-class delivery standards across digitisation; technology and operations in our drive to win. We’re looking for talented individuals who have a deep customer o