Lead Enterprise Data Steward

Lead, Enterprise Data Governance

The Lead Data Steward serves as a dedicated Data Steward responsible for the day-to-day operational oversight of assigned data assets and plays a key role in ensuring data quality, integrity, usability, and proper use across the organization. This position partners with business and technical teams to drive metadata management standards, strengthen data governance processes, and scale stewardship practices enterprise-wide.

The Lead Data Steward works to analyze complex data issues, assess business and risk impacts, recommend solutions, and advocate for responsible data management across the enterprise.

Key Responsibilities

Operational Data Stewardship

• Define, validate, and curate business and technical metadata for assigned data assets, including business definitions, critical data elements, lineage, reference data, data dictionaries, quality rules, ownership, and approved usage context.
• Maintain metadata and stewardship artifacts in enterprise governance tools, including business glossary terms, data catalog entries, lineage documentation, issue records, ownership assignments, and approval workflows.
• Ensure metadata accuracy and completeness through regular review cycles, validation with supporting SMEs, and alignment to enterprise standards.
• Monitor data quality indicators, assess impacts to downstream use cases, triage issues based on severity and business impact, and coordinate remediation across business, IT, analytics, operations, product, and vendor teams.
• Perform or coordinate root-cause analysis for recurring or high-impact data quality issues and recommend preventive controls, process changes, ownership clarification, or system remediation.
• Interpret enterprise data governance policies, standards, and controls as they apply to assigned assets, including data classification, sensitivity, privacy, access, retention, and responsible use requirements.
• Facilitate policy exception, data access, and data use reviews by assessing risk, documenting rationale, coordinating approvals, and tracking compensating controls where required.
• Support trusted data use for reporting, analytics, data products, automation, and AI-enabled initiatives by ensuring assigned assets are well-defined, quality-monitored, traceable, and aligned to approved business context.
• Actively participate in domain-based governance and stewardship working groups, representing assigned data assets and escalating risks, decisions, and improvement opportunities.
• Partner with Data Owners, Product Owners, Architects, and domain leaders to align stewardship priorities to domain roadmaps and enterprise initiatives.

Enterprise Stewardship Enablement

• Collaborate with department leaders, analysts, system owners, SMEs, and technology partners to promote stewardship practices across the enterprise.
• Support the development and continuous improvement of stewardship standards, procedures, templates, intake processes, escalation paths, role definitions, and performance measures.
• Help mature the enterprise stewardship operating model, including RACI alignment, decision rights, governance forums, stewardship workflows, and issue-management practices.
• Facilitate knowledge sharing and help socialize stewardship roles, responsibilities, standards, and processes across teams.
• Contribute to the scaling of an enterprise data stewardship community through training, documentation, onboarding materials, process guidance, and practical examples.
• Compile and analyze data quality metrics and stewardship KPIs; produce reports and insights to highlight trends, risks, gaps, and improvement opportunities.
• Conduct benchmarking, maturity assessments, stakeholder feedback reviews, and other evaluations to identify emerging data governance needs or gaps.
• Provide strategic recommendations to leadership on data quality risks, governance priorities, stewardship, and opportunities to advance enterprise data effectiveness.

Cross-Functional Collaboration & Leadership

• Partner with project teams to ensure data governance, data quality, metadata, privacy, security, and responsible-use principles are integrated into system implementations, enhancements, migrations, reporting solutions, and workflows.
• Participate in or lead governance working groups, stewardship forums, data asset reviews, quality issue reviews, and cross-functional problem-solving sessions.
• Facilitate discussions with business and technical stakeholders to resolve ambiguity, clarify definitions, align ownership, prioritize issues, and drive decisions.
• Translate between business requirements and technical data concepts to ensure data standards, definitions, quality rules, and controls are practical, understood, and implementable.
• Influence stakeholders and advocate for disciplined data management practices.

Required Qualifications

• Bachelor's degree.
• 5+ years of experience in data management, data governance, data quality, business analysis, analytics.
• 2+ years in or supporting data governance, data stewardship, data quality, metadata management, or related data management programs.
• Experience defining, maintaining, or using business metadata, data dictionaries, data catalogs, business glossaries, critical data elements, lineage, reference data, or data quality rules.
• Working knowledge of data governance concepts, including data ownership, stewardship, metadata management, data quality, data classification, access and use controls, policy adherence, and issue management.
• 2+ years managing complex data issues, assess business impact, support root-cause analysis, recommend solutions, and collaborate across multiple teams and business areas.
• Demonstrated commitment to improving data quality, usability, and responsible data use across the enterprise.

Preferred Qualifications

• 5+ years of experience in data management, data quality, business analysis, analytics, governance, or a related discipline in the healthcare industry.
• Experience with healthcare data domains such as member, provider, claims, clinical, financial, operational, product, regulatory, or customer data.
• Familiarity with healthcare privacy, security, regulatory, and compliance expectations, including HIPAA or other applicable healthcare data handling requirements.
• Experience with data governance tools, data catalog platforms, data quality tools, metadata management tools, workflow systems, or issue management platforms.
• Familiarity with tools such as Collibra, Informatica, Alation, Microsoft Purview, Atlan, ServiceNow, Jira, or similar platforms.
• Familiarity with SQL, data profiling, BI/reporting tools, cloud data platforms, data warehouses, data lakes, master data, reference data, or data lineage concepts.
• Experience supporting governance for reporting, analytics, data products, digital transformation, automation, or AI-enabled initiatives.
• Certifications such as Certified Data Management Professional — DAMA CDMP, Data Governance and Stewardship Professional, Applied Data Governance Practitioner, or equivalent data governance/data management certification.

Additional Information

This position follows a remote work style however the candidate must live close to one of our designated IT locations: Louisville, KY; Tampa, FL; Dallas, TX; Boston, MA; New York City; Washington, D.C; Atlanta, GA, Nashville, TN, Chicago, IL or Charlotte, NC.

As part of our hiring process for this opportunity, we will be using an interviewing technology called HireVue to enhance our hiring and decision-making ability. HireVue allows us to quickly connect and gain valuable information from you pertaining to your relevant skills and experience at a time that is best for your schedule.

To ensure Home or Hybrid Home/Office employees' ability to work effectively, the self-provided internet service of Home or Hybrid Home/Office employees must meet the following criteria: At minimum, a download speed of 25 Mbps and an upload speed of 10 Mbps is required; wireless, wired cable or DSL connection is suggested. Satellite, cellular and microwave connection can be used only if approved by leadership. Employees who live and work from Home in the state of California, Illinois, Montana, or South Dakota will be provided a bi-weekly payment for their internet expense. Humana will provide Home or Hybrid Home/Office employees with telephone equipment appropriate to meet the business requirements for their position/job. Work from a dedicated space lacking ongoing interruptions to protect member PHI / HIPAA information.

Travel: While this is a remote position, occasional travel to Humana's offices for training or meetings may be required.

Scheduled Weekly Hours: 40

Pay Range: $117,600 - $161,700 per year. This job is eligible for a bonus incentive plan. This incentive opportunity is based upon company and/or individual performance.

Description of Benefits: Humana, Inc. and its affiliated subsidiaries (collectively, "Humana") offers competitive benefits that support whole-person well-being. Associate benefits are designed to encourage personal wellness and smart healthcare decisions for you and your family while also knowing your life extends outside of work. Among our benefits, Humana provides medical, dental and vision benefits, 401(k) retirement savings plan, time off (including paid time off, company and personal holidays, volunteer time off, paid parental