Data Scientist – OCR & Document Digitization

⚠️ Please Note: This role is NOT open for C2C. Only W2 candidates will be considered.

Position: Data Scientist – OCR & Document Digitization

Location: Remote (Chicago, IL, or New York, NY candidates preferred)

Duration: 1-Year Contract + Potential Extensions

Job Summary:

We are seeking an experienced Data Scientist to develop and improve OCR-based document digitization solutions, focusing on reducing fax-related costs and improving operational efficiency. The role involves working with LLMs, cloud-based OCR tools, and traditional OCR technologies to extract and validate information from handwritten documents and poor-quality faxes. The ideal candidate must combine strong technical expertise with business understanding, stakeholder communication, and the ability to evaluate technical trade-offs. This position requires end-to-end ownership of production solutions while collaborating with technical and nontechnical teams to deliver measurable business improvements.

Must-Have Skills:

• 5+ years of relevant Data Science experience.
• Strong hands-on experience with Optical Character Recognition (OCR).
• Experience with LLM-based OCR, cloud OCR tools, and traditional OCR technologies such as Tesseract.
• Experience processing handwritten documents, poor-quality faxes, and image artifacts.
• Experience with database validation and improving data extraction accuracy.
• Strong programming skills in Python and SQL.
• Familiarity with Google Cloud Platform (GCP).
• Experience developing, deploying, and maintaining production applications.
• Strong understanding of OCR tool limitations, data quality challenges, and improvement strategies.
• Excellent stakeholder communication and business understanding.
• Ability to explain technical trade-offs and gain buy-in from business stakeholders.
• Experience collaborating with technical and nontechnical teams.
• Demonstrated end-to-end ownership of complex or ambiguous projects with limited supervision.
• Strong technical judgment, problem-solving skills, and an outcome-oriented mindset.
• Growth mindset and ability to build upon existing solutions rather than starting from scratch.

Responsibilities:

• Develop, deploy, and maintain production OCR solutions to digitize incoming faxes and improve document processing.

• Process handwritten documents, poor-quality faxes, and image artifacts while improving extraction accuracy and validating data.

• Evaluate LLMs, cloud-based OCR services, and traditional OCR tools to identify suitable technical solutions.

• Analyze existing fax-related workflows, identify why providers continue sending faxes, and recommend process or vendor improvements to reduce costs.

• Collaborate with technical and business stakeholders to explain solution trade-offs, gain alignment, and drive business decisions.

• Take ownership of end-to-end project delivery, leveraging existing solutions and working closely with team members to achieve measurable business outcomes.

• Develop, deploy, and maintain production OCR solutions to digitize incoming faxes and improve document processing.

• Process handwritten documents, poor-quality faxes, and image artifacts while improving extraction accuracy and validating data.

• Evaluate LLMs, cloud-based OCR services, and traditional OCR tools to identify suitable technical solutions.

• Analyze existing fax-related workflows, identify why providers continue sending faxes, and recommend process or vendor improvements to reduce costs.

• Collaborate with technical and business stakeholders to explain solution trade-offs, gain alignment, and drive business decisions.

• Take ownership of end-to-end project delivery, leveraging existing solutions and working closely with team members to achieve measurable business outcomes.