Principal Solution Architect

Job Title: Principal Solution Architect

About the Role

We are seeking a Principal Solution Architect (Snowflake) to lead the end-to-end architecture and design of a Customer Data Platform (CDP) for our end client. The ideal candidate will have deep expertise in Snowflake and a proven track record of building enterprise-grade data platforms that unify customer data across multiple systems for analytics, personalization, and AI-driven insights.

This role requires both technical leadership and strong stakeholder communication, as you'll collaborate closely with business, engineering, and product teams to define architecture standards, governance, and scalable data models.

Key Responsibilities

• Lead the overall architecture, design, and implementation of the Customer Data Platform (CDP) on Snowflake.
• Define the end-to-end data flow - from ingestion and transformation to data activation and consumption.
• Design data models, data marts, and analytical layers to support 360° customer views, segmentation, and personalization.
• Integrate data from diverse sources such as CRM, marketing, sales, web analytics, and product telemetry.
• Define data governance, security, and privacy frameworks ensuring compliance (GDPR, CCPA, etc.).
• Partner with cross-functional teams (data engineering, product, marketing, and analytics) to align architecture with business outcomes.
• Evaluate and recommend modern data tools for ETL/ELT, orchestration, and data activation layers.
• Guide and mentor data engineering teams in best practices for Snowflake performance tuning, cost optimization, and CI/CD automation.
• Communicate architecture decisions and technical concepts effectively to both technical and non-technical stakeholders.

Required Skills & Experience

• 12+ years in data engineering and architecture, with 4+ years focused on Snowflake.
• Proven experience designing and implementing Customer Data Platforms (CDPs) or similar large-scale analytical ecosystems.
• Strong expertise in:
• Snowflake architecture (Virtual Warehouses, Secure Data Sharing, Streams, Tasks, Time Travel, etc.)
• DBT or equivalent ELT frameworks
• Ingestion tools (SnapLogic, Matillion, Workato, or similar)
• Orchestration tools (Airflow, Dagster, or similar)
• Hands-on experience integrating marketing, CRM, and digital analytics data sources.
• Solid understanding of data governance, MDM, and metadata management concepts.
• Exposure to AI/ML or real-time data activation use cases within a CDP is a plus.
• Excellent communication and presentation skills - able to engage business and technical stakeholders confidently.
• Experience working in client-facing consulting environments preferred.

Nice to Have

• SnowPro Advanced Architect certification
• Experience with data privacy frameworks and customer consent management
• Knowledge of Python, SQL optimization, or real-time streaming (Kafka, Kinesis)