Senior Director, ML/AI - Search and Recommendations (Seattle)

At Expedia Group, we help travelers explore the world, one journey at a time. As a global travel company powered by passionate people, trusted partnerships, and leading technology, we connect travelers, partners, and advertisers through our consumer brands, B2B network, and travel advertising business.Here, you'll do meaningful work that helps millions of people discover, book, and experience travel with more ease, confidence, and joy. Our five Behaviors-Traveler First, Think Big, Operate with Excellence, Ownership Mindset, and Succeed Together-help foster a supportive environment where people can grow their careers and have the flexibility, benefits, and support to do their best work. Join us and build for travelers everywhere.Senior Director, ML/AI - Search and RecommendationIntroduction to TeamExpedia Product & Technology builds innovative products, services, and tools to deliver high-quality experiences for travelers, partners, and our employees. A singular technology platform powered by data and machine learning provides secure, differentiated, and personalized experiences for the traveler and our partners that drive loyalty and customer satisfaction.The AI & ML organization is the engine of our marketplace, and Search and Recommendation is its most strategically important component. This role leads the centralized science portfolio that defines how millions of travelers discover the world: directly creating the algorithms that power the core marketplace dynamics across Vrbo, Hotels.com, and Expedia. We are at a pivotal moment of transformation, moving beyond siloed models to build Ranking Foundation Models that capture universal traveler preferences and distill this intelligence across vertical use cases. You will lead the teams responsible for the core ranking algorithms and retrieval systems that serve as the primary interface between traveler intent and our global supply.In the role you willLead the Strategic Vision: Define and execute the scientific roadmap for the company’s most critical asset, the Search and Recommendation stack. Drive the shift from classical ranking to next-generation, AI-native discovery experiences using the latest AI breakthroughs.Serve as a Key Strategic Partner: Act as the primary counterpart to senior Product and Engineering leadership. You will not just support the roadmap but actively shape it, determining how centralized ranking capabilities can unlock new marketplace opportunities and streamline the architecture.Make Technical Architecture Decisions: Own the high-level architectural decision-making for search ranking and recommendations. You will decide how to integrate the latest AI (e.g., Vector Search, RAG, Hybrid Retrieval) into our production stack, balancing performance, latency, cost, and scalability.Develop Ranking Foundation Models & Distill Intelligence: Champion a strategy to move from fragmented models to large-scale Ranking Foundation Models. Oversee the training of massive, multi-objective architectures (e.g., Transformer-based ranking, Universal User/Item Representations) and orchestrate the distillation of this core ranking intelligence into efficient, vertical-specific models.Lead and Scale High-Performing Teams: Manage and mentor a large, multi-disciplinary organization of Applied Scientists and ML Leaders. Foster a culture that bridges the gap between state-of-the-art research and high-velocity product deployment.Drive Marketplace Health: Ensure our algorithms optimize for long-term business value while maintaining a healthy ecosystem for our supply partners.Minimum QualificationsPhD or Master’s in Computer Science, Machine Learning, Statistics, or a related field, or equivalent professional experience.15+ years of experience in Data Science and Machine Learning, with 8+ years of experience managing high-performing science teams and managing managers.Deep technical authority in Search and Ranking: Proven experience designing and deploying large-scale Ranking Foundation Models, Representation Learning, and Retrieval systems (e.g., Learning-to-Rank, Two-Tower architectures, Multi-Task Learning).Expertise in Model Distillation: Experience training large-scale Teacher models and applying Knowledge Distillation techniques to create efficient Student models for high-throughput production ranking.Architectural Leadership: Experience making build-vs-buy decisions and designing ML systems that handle massive scale and real-time inference requirements.Stakeholder Influence: Strong business acumen and ability to influence executive stakeholders; capable of explaining complex architectural trade-offs to non-technical partners.Preferred QualificationsExperience leading ML/AI teams in a two-sided marketplace, balancing supply and demand dynamics.A track record of successfully migrating legacy search stacks to modern, deep-learning, or vector-based architectures.Proven track record as a recognized industry leader (e.g., conference talks at RecSys/SIGIR/KDD, patents, or open-source contributions).Exceptional organizational leadership skills, with a history of attracting top talent and designing effective org structures for hybrid Research/Engineering teams.The total cash range for this position in Seattle is $296,000.00 to $414,500.00. Employees in this role have the potential to increase their pay up to $473,500.00, which is the top of the range, based on ongoing, demonstrated, and sustained performance in the role.The total cash range for this position in San Jose is $323,000.00 to $452,500.00. Employees in this role have the potential to increase their pay up to $517,000.00, which is the top of the range, based on ongoing, demonstrated, and sustained performance in the role.Starting pay for this role will vary based on multiple factors, including location, available budget, and an individual’s knowledge, skills, and experience. Pay ranges may be modified in the future.Benefits and perksExpedia Group offers benefits and perks designed to support employees and their families, including medical, dental, and vision coverage, paid time off, an Employee Assistance Program, wellness and travel reimbursement, travel discounts, and International Airlines Travel Agent Network (IATAN) membership. Learn more about life at Expedia Group at .Accommodation requestsExpedia Group is committed to providing an inclusive and accessible recruiting experience. If you need an accommodation or adjustment due to a disability during the application or recruiting process, please submit a request at .About Expedia GroupExpedia Group includes three flagship consumer brands - Expedia, Hotels.com, and Vrbo - along with a leading B2B travel business and travel advertising offerings. Across our brands and business, we help travelers explore the world with confidence and ease.Important noticeEmployment opportunities and job offers at Expedia Group will always come from Expedia Group's Talent Acquisition and hiring teams. Never share sensitive personal information unless you are confident of the recipient. Expedia Group does not extend job offers via email or messaging tools to individuals with whom we have not made prior contact. Our email domain is @expediagroup.com. The official place to find and apply for roles is .Equal OpportunityExpedia is committed to creating an inclusive work environment with a diverse workforce. All qualified applicants will receive consideration for employment without regard to race, color, religion, gender, gender identity or expression, sexual orientation, national origin, genetics, disability, age, veteran status, or any other characteristic protected by law. This employer participates in E-Verify. The employer will provide the Social Security Administration (SSA) and, if necessary, the Department of Homeland Security (DHS) with information from each new employee's I-9 to confirm work authorization.SummaryLocation: Washington - Seattle Campus; USA - California - San JoseType: Full time