Principal Data Architect

Role Description

The Principal Data Architect is isolved's senior authority on how data is structured, classified, secured, and moved across our systems, from ingestion through downstream consumption. This is a companion role to the Principal Platform Architect, focused not on the platforms themselves but on the data that flows through them: its structure, flow, lineage, integrity, and cleanliness. The successful candidate brings a rare combination of deep big data, data warehouse, data science, and data analytics experience, with fluency in modern data architecture patterns.

• Architect and govern isolved's data structures, classifications, and flows across the full data lifecycle.
• Design and evolve data architecture patterns, including medallion architecture, data mesh, data cubes, and materialized views.
• Own data lineage, integrity, and cleanliness standards, partnering with engineering teams to implement and enforce them.
• Architect and optimize data pipelines built on isolved's core data tooling: Databricks, Snowflake, dbt, Fivetran, and Hightouch.
• Design pipeline orchestration patterns using Airflow or equivalent tooling.
• Define governance, access controls, and lineage tracking for data shared externally or across teams.
• Partner with the integrations team on the data architecture underpinning Parabola.io and Workato-based integration workflows.
• Translate business and analytical needs into well-structured data models, warehouses, and pipelines.
• Write production-quality code, including PySpark, Python, and SQL.
• Use Git and GitHub Actions to manage version control and CI/CD for data pipeline code and infrastructure.
• Apply working knowledge of Terraform and Azure infrastructure.
• Establish and maintain data governance practices.
• Partner with security and compliance stakeholders to ensure data handling practices meet privacy and regulatory requirements.
• Design performant data models and semantic layers that support downstream BI and reporting tools.
• Extend data architecture patterns to real-time and streaming use cases.
• Define data lifecycle, retention, and archival practices.
• Serve as a customer-facing and cross-functional voice on data architecture.
• Evaluate and apply AI development practices to data architecture, tooling, and automation.
• Document data architecture standards, lineage, and governance practices.

Qualifications

• Bachelor's degree in computer science, data engineering, information systems, or related field, or equivalent practical experience.
• Solid experience with Databricks (Azure preferred).
• Deep experience across big data, data warehousing, data science, and data analytics.
• Tenured experience in dbt, Fivetran, and HighTouch desired.
• Expert-level SQL, with strong hands-on experience in PySpark and Python.
• Strong understanding of medallion architecture, data mesh, data cubes, and materialized views.
• Demonstrated experience across the full data pipeline lifecycle.
• Experience with Git and GitHub Actions for version control and CI/CD.
• Working familiarity with Terraform and Azure infrastructure.
• Excellent soft skills, with customer-facing experience strongly preferred.
• Expert use of AI tools in day-to-day development and data work.
• Experience with data governance and cataloging tools.
• Familiarity with data quality and testing frameworks.
• Solid grasp of dimensional data modeling techniques.
• Understanding of data privacy and compliance considerations.
• Experience with BI and visualization tools is a plus.
• Familiarity with streaming/real-time data technologies.
• Understanding of data lifecycle management, retention/archival policies, and storage/compute cost optimization.
• Experience with Snowflake as a cloud data warehouse platform.
• Experience with Airflow or equivalent workflow orchestration tools.
• Experience with data sharing technologies and patterns.
• Preferred: hands-on experience with big data ecosystem services.
• Strong presentation and stakeholder communication skills.

Requirements

• Typically requires a minimum of 10-15 years of related experience with a Bachelor's degree, or an equivalent combination of education and hands-on experience.

Benefits

• Comprehensive list of employee total rewards offerings.

Company Description

isolved is a provider of human capital management (HCM) solutions that help organizations recruit, retain and elevate their workforce. More than 195,000 employers and 8 million employees rely on isolved's software and services to streamline human resource (HR) operations and deliver employee experiences that matter.

isolved People Cloud™ is a unified yet modular HCM platform with built-in artificial intelligence (AI) and analytics that connects HR, payroll, benefits, and workforce and talent management into a single solution that drives better business outcomes.

Through the Sidekick Advantage™, isolved also provides expert guidance, embedded services and an engaged community that empowers People Heroes™ to grow their companies and careers.