Data Engineer/Data Architect

Senior Data Engineer / Data Architect Location: Fort Lauderdale, FL Work Arrangement: Fully onsite Employment Type: Direct hire, full-time Role Type: Hands-on individual contributor and technical lead Position Overview We are seeking a Senior Data Engineer / Data Architect to lead the design and hands-on development of our enterprise data foundation. This role will connect data across ERP, CRM, ecommerce, marketing, production, finance, fulfillment, and internal business systems to support trusted reporting, AI initiatives, automation, and internal applications. This is not an architecture-only or advisory position. The successful candidate must have genuine architecture experience and the ability to personally build production-grade data platforms, pipelines, models, integrations, quality controls, and data services from the ground up. The ideal candidate combines strong engineering execution with the ability to define scalable architecture, establish technical standards, and communicate effectively with both technical and business stakeholders. Top Requirements Hands-on experience with Databricks , including Lakehouse architecture, Apache Spark, data pipelines, notebooks, workflows, and production deployments. True data architecture experience , including designing enterprise data platforms, defining systems of record, developing data models, establishing data governance, and making cross-system architecture decisions. Demonstrated success engineering implementations from the ground up , rather than only maintaining or advising on existing solutions. Key Responsibilities Data Architecture Assess the current data environment, including systems, databases, APIs, integrations, reports, scheduled jobs, and data owners. Design and implement a scalable enterprise data architecture supporting reporting, AI, analytics, and internal applications. Define authoritative systems of record for customer, product, order, revenue, inventory, location, marketing, and production data. Establish common data models, identifiers, data contracts, schema standards, retention policies, and integration patterns. Determine appropriate use of batch processing, real-time events, APIs, webhooks, and governed data services. Develop architecture diagrams, technical standards, roadmaps, and implementation plans. Data Engineering and Implementation Build production-grade data pipelines and lakehouse solutions in Databricks. Develop reliable ETL and ELT processes using SQL, Python, Apache Spark, and orchestration tools. Integrate data from ERP, CRM, ecommerce, marketing, manufacturing, finance, and internal applications. Create tested transformations that produce consistent and reusable business data. Build secure APIs and data services for approved reporting, AI, automation, and application use cases. Design systems that handle failures, changing schemas, retries, late-arriving data, and duplicate-processing risks. Establish source control, automated testing, code review, deployment pipelines, and release processes for data engineering work. Data Quality and Reliability Implement automated checks for completeness, accuracy, freshness, duplication, volume changes, and consistency. Reconcile key business measures such as orders, revenue, inventory, customer counts, and production activity across systems. Monitor pipeline performance, failed jobs, delayed data, schema changes, and data-quality incidents. Build alerting, operational dashboards, runbooks, and incident-response processes. Work with source-system owners to correct the root causes of data issues. Governance, Security, and Documentation Establish practical standards for data ownership, classification, access, retention, and approved use. Apply role-based access controls, encryption, audit logging, and appropriate protection for sensitive and confidential information. Maintain clear data definitions, lineage, integration documentation, runbooks, and architecture diagrams. Partner with IT, Legal, Infrastructure, Applications, and business leaders on privacy, security, and compliance requirements. Create governed access patterns that reduce uncontrolled direct access to production systems. Reporting, AI, and Internal Applications Develop trusted, reusable data models for reporting, dashboards, forecasting, and business analysis. Prepare structured and governed data for AI agents, retrieval systems, automations, machine learning, and internal applications. Partner with the Director of AI and internal product teams to accelerate delivery of data and AI use cases. Establish standards for monitoring how applications and AI solutions access and use company data. Cross-Functional Leadership Collaborate with technology, finance, operations, ecommerce, marketing, sales, production, and other business teams. Translate technical data risks into clear business impacts, options, costs, and recommended actions. Review vendor-built integrations for documentation, security, maintainability, and quality. Provide technical leadership and establish standards that improve how teams collect, define, share, and use data. Work independently, set priorities, document decisions, and deliver measurable results. By submitting to this position, you are agreeing to be included in our talent pool for future hiring for similarly qualified positions. EEO Notice Vaco by Highspring is an Equal Opportunity Employer and does not discriminate against any employee or applicant for employment because of race (including but not limited to traits historically associated with race such as hair texture and hair style), color, sex (includes pregnancy or related conditions), religion or creed, national origin, citizenship, age, disability, status as a veteran, union membership, ethnicity, gender, gender identity, gender expression, sexual orientation, marital status, political affiliation, or any other protected characteristics as required by federal, state or local law. Vaco by Highspring and its parents, affiliates, and subsidiaries are committed to the full inclusion of all qualified individuals. As part of this commitment, Vaco by Highspring and its parents, affiliates, and subsidiaries will ensure that persons with disabilities are provided reasonable accommodations. If reasonable accommodation is needed to participate in the job application or interview process, to perform essential job functions, and/or to receive other benefits and privileges of employment, please contact View email address on click.appcast.io . Vaco by Highspring also wants all applicants to know their rights that workplace discrimination is illegal . Representation Notice By submitting to this position, you agree that you will be giving Vaco by Highspring the exclusive right to present your as a candidate for the foregoing employment opportunity. You further agree that you have represented information about yourself accurately and have not affirmatively misrepresented your qualifications. You also agree to maintain as confidential, to the fullest extent permitted by law, any information you learn from Vaco by Highspring about the position and you will limit disclosure of information about the position only to the extent necessary to perform any obligations in furtherance of your application. In exchange, Vaco by Highspring agrees to exercise reasonable efforts to represent you through all solicitation, job screening and resume dispersal. For residents of Ontario, Canada: Based on Highspring's discussions with its Client, Highspring's understanding is that this position for employment is a current vacancy (either through Highspring as a contractor or with the client directly). Privacy Notice Vaco by Highspring and its parents, affiliates, and subsidiaries ("we," "our," or "Vaco by Highspring") respects your privacy and are committed to providing transparent notice of our policies. California residents may access Vaco by Highspring HR Notice at Collection for California Applicants and Employees here . Virginia residents may access our state specific policies here . Residents of all other states may access our policies here . Canadian residents may access our policies in English here and in French here . Residents of countries governed by GDPR may access our policies here . Additionally, submissions to this position are subject to the use of AI to perform preliminary candidate screenings, focused on ensuring minimum job requirements noted in the position are satisfied. More details about Vaco by Highspring's use of AI can be found here ( ). Further assessment of candidates beyond this initial phase will be conducted by recruiters and hiring managers. Vaco by Highspring does not know and cannot opine on if its client's use of AI products in hiring. Pay Transparency Notice Determining compensation for this role (and others) at Vaco by Highspring depends upon a wide array of factors including but not limited to: the individual's skill sets, experience and training; licensure and certification requirements; office location and other geographic considerations; other business and organizational needs. With that said, as required by local law, Vaco by Highspring believes that the following salary range referenced above reasonably estimates the base compensation for an individual hired into this position in geographies that require salary range disclosure. The individual may also be eligible for discretionary bonuses. Vaco