Lead Data Engineer at National Grid

The Sustainability Grid; Greater London; Hybrid; GBP 54,000 - 65,000; Full time

Benefits offered by this job

26 days annual leave

Pension with employer contributions

Life insurance

Private Medical Insurance

Share incentive plan

Job summary

National Grid is seeking a Lead Data Engineer to architect, build and operate data products and pipelines to support the Electricity Transmission business. Based from Warwick with hybrid flexibility, you will guide engineering standards, ensure governance, and mentor engineers enabling data-driven decisions across multiple teams.

You will lead ingestion, transformation, modelling, testing and deployment while collaborating with data science workloads and regulatory functions.

Qualifications

• Experience leading a data engineering team or workstream.
• Strong stakeholder and user engagement experience.
• Experience working with large datasets, data mining, data profiling and ETL development.
• Experience delivering data products or working within a data development environment.
• Understanding of risk, controls and data governance.
• Strong understanding of modern data architecture patterns.

Responsibilities

• Lead the design, development and delivery of data products and pipelines.
• Set engineering standards covering architecture, coding, testing, CI/CD and deployment.
• Take technical accountability for the solutions delivered by the team.
• Establish scalable, repeatable and supportable engineering patterns.
• Own data products across ingestion, transformation, modelling, testing, deployment and monitoring.
• Develop ETL pipelines and data models for reporting, analytics, AI and data science workloads.
• Work with large datasets, data profiling and data quality frameworks.
• Ensure data products meet governance, security and operational requirements.
• Work with system, solution and data architects to develop target-state architecture.
• Define integration patterns, interface contracts, data modelling approaches and non-functional requirements.
• Apply modern data architecture approaches including data mesh, data fabric, Lakehouse and domain-oriented ownership.
• Maintain strong data governance and quality controls throughout the product lifecycle.

Skills

Data engineering leadership

Stakeholder engagement

ETL development

SQL

Python

dbt

Data modelling

Governance

Cloud/DevOps certifications

Tools

Snowflake

Microsoft Fabric

Power BI

Tableau

DataOps.live

C#

Job description

National Grid is a major energy infrastructure company working to deliver a secure, reliable and increasingly sustainable energy system. Through National Grid Electricity Transmission (NGET), the organisation operates the UK's electricity transmission network and is playing a central role in the country's transition toward Net Zero.

By The Sustainability Grid Desk

Location Warwick, United Kingdom

Type Hybrid

Salary £54,000 to £65,000 per year, depending on capability

Experience Lead / Senior Data Engineering

Type Full-time

Deadline 9 September 2026

About National Grid

National Grid is looking for a Lead Data Engineer to help build the data infrastructure that supports this transition.

The Opportunity

Based from National Grid's Warwick office with flexible hybrid working, this role will provide technical leadership for data engineering within the Electricity Transmission business.

You will design, build and operate data products that help engineers, operational teams, planners, performance teams and regulatory functions access reliable, accessible and actionable information.

As the technical lead, you will set engineering standards, shape architecture, mentor other engineers and take end-to-end ownership of data pipelines and products.

What You’ll Do

Technical Leadership

• Lead the design, development and delivery of data products and pipelines.
• Set engineering standards covering architecture, coding, testing, code review, CI/CD and deployment.
• Take technical accountability for the solutions delivered by the team.
• Establish scalable, repeatable and supportable engineering patterns.
• Own data products across ingestion, transformation, modelling, testing, deployment and monitoring.
• Develop ETL pipelines and data models for reporting, analytics, AI and data science workloads.
• Work with large datasets, data profiling and data quality frameworks.
• Ensure data products meet governance, security and operational requirements.
• Work with system, solution and data architects to develop target-state architecture.
• Define integration patterns, interface contracts, data modelling approaches and non-functional requirements.
• Apply modern data architecture approaches including data mesh, data fabric, Lakehouse and domain-oriented ownership.
• Maintain strong data governance and quality controls throughout the product lifecycle.

Stakeholder & Business Engagement

• Work with Electricity Transmission stakeholders to identify business challenges that can be addressed through data.
• Translate business requirements into impactful data products.
• Assess business readiness and ensure data products drive meaningful action.
• Analyse insights and trends to identify opportunities to improve business performance.

Mentoring & Capability Building

• Mentor data engineers across the team and wider engineering community.
• Review technical work and provide engineering direction.
• Help develop capabilities in areas where the organisation needs deeper expertise.
• Create opportunities for engineers to progress professionally.

Requirements

Core Qualifications

• Demonstrable experience leading a data engineering team or workstream.
• Experience setting technical direction and reviewing other engineers' work.
• Strong stakeholder and user engagement experience.
• Experience working with large datasets, data mining, data profiling and ETL development.
• Experience delivering data products or working within a data development environment.
• Understanding of risk, controls and data governance.
• Strong understanding of modern data architecture patterns.

Technical Expertise

• SQL
• Python
• dbt
• Data transformation and ETL
• Git

Relevant technologies include:

• Snowflake
• Promethium
• Microsoft Fabric
• Microsoft Power BI
• Tableau
• DataOps.live
• C#
• Experience supporting data science and AI/ML workloads
• Additional cloud or DevOps certifications

Professional Strengths

National Grid is looking for someone who can combine strong technical capability with commercial and operational awareness. You should be comfortable translating complex data challenges into practical solutions, communicating with stakeholders and taking accountability for the reliability and performance of the products you build.

The successful candidate will receive:

• 26 days of annual leave plus eight statutory days.
• Option to purchase additional holiday days.
• Option to holiday-swap up to three bank holidays.
• Annual performance incentive.
• Generous pension scheme with contributions double-matched up to 6% of salary.
• Life insurance worth 10 times basic salary.
• Employer contribution towards Private Medical Insurance.
• Share incentive plan.
• Salary sacrifice car and technology schemes.
• Employee assistance support.
• Matched charity giving.
• Flexible hybrid working.

Why This Role Matters

The UK’s transition to a Net Zero energy system will depend on more than renewable generation and upgraded infrastructure. It will also depend on the quality of the data used to plan, operate and regulate that infrastructure.

This role sits directly within that challenge.

As Lead Data Engineer, you will help build the data products that Electricity Transmission relies on to understand performance, make decisions and operate a critical national network.

It is an opportunity to combine data engineering, technical leadership and energy transition in one role.

Important Eligibility Information

The position closes at midnight on 9 September 2026, although National Grid encourages candidates to apply early.

In most cases, National Grid cannot provide sponsorship under the UK's points-based immigration system. Applicants should therefore have the legal right to work in the UK without requiring sponsorship now or in the future. Exceptional sponsorship circumstances may be considered where specialist skills cannot be sourced from the local labour market.