Staff Software Engineer - Data Platform

Joinimagine; Pune District; Hybrid; INR 3,000,000 - 5,500,000; Full time

Job summary

Zendesk is seeking an experienced Staff Data Platform Engineer to drive the design and delivery of a scalable data infrastructure powering analytics and AI integrations. Based in Pune, you will lead architecture, governance, and platform improvements across ingestion, storage, and orchestration, collaborating with multiple teams.

You will own standards for data modeling, testing, CI/CD, and infrastructure as code, while raising the bar for reliability and developer experience in a hybrid,

Qualifications

• 10+ years of software/data engineering background, with 3+ years in Platform Engineering or Data Infrastructure.
• 3+ years leading cross-team architecture and infrastructure initiatives at Staff level.
• Hands-on experience with AWS, GCP, or Azure; AWS preferred.
• Experience automating CI/CD pipelines (Github Actions/Jenkins).
• Proficiency in SQL; comfortable with Python/Go/Java/Scala.
• Working knowledge of Docker and data orchestration tools (Airflow).
• Strong communication across time zones and ability to work independently or in a team.

Responsibilities

• Define end-to-end data platform architecture across ingestion, transformation, storage and governance.
• Establish data contracts, schemas, documentation, and tooling to speed analytics.
• Lead build-vs-buy evaluations and pilot new technologies for reliability and cost.
• Design secure, highly-available data services and large-scale pipelines.
• Own and optimize the core orchestration platform (Airflow); improve deployment workflows.

Skills

Staff leadership

Data platform architecture

Cloud environments

Terraform

CI/CD

Airflow

Python/Go/Java

SQL

Tools

Terraform

CloudFormation

Github Actions

Jenkins

Docker

Snowflake

dbt

Astronomer Airflow

Job description

Job Description

What we are looking for:

Our Enterprise Data & Analytics (EDA) is looking for an experienced Staff Data Platform Engineer to join our growing Platform engineering team. You’ll work in a collaborative Agile environment, driving innovations in data infrastructure that not only powers advanced analytics but also lays the foundation for AI and machine learning integration across Zendesk’s data platform.

About the team:

We are a newly formed Data Platform Team here in Pune dedicated to developing and maintaining Zendesk’s data platform that powers next‑generation reporting and analytics across the product portfolio. As a Staff Data Platform Engineer, you will work on designing and developing advanced data infrastructure that power the Zendesk Data Platform.

Data is at the heart of Zendesk’s business—this is a high-impact, high-ownership role with broad technical and organizational influence.

What you get to do every single day

• Lead architecture and roadmap
  • Define and evolve the end-to-end data platform architecture across ingestion, transformation, storage and governance.
  • Establish standardized data contracts, schemas, documentation, and tooling that improve consistency and reduce time-to-data for analytics and product teams.
  • Lead build-vs-buy evaluations and pilot new technologies to improve reliability, speed, or cost.
• Deliver platform capabilities at scale
  • Design and deliver secure, and highly-available data services and pipelines handling large-scale, mission-critical workloads.
  • Own, operate, and scale our core orchestration platform (Astronomer / Apache Airflow), optimizing performance, deployment workflows, and infrastructure costs
• Raise the engineering bar
  • Define standards for data modeling, testing (unit/integration/contract), CI/CD, Infrastructure as Code, and code quality; champion reproducibility and reliability.
  • Conduct deep root cause analyses; drive systemic fixes that improve resilience and developer experience.

What you bring to the role

Basic qualifications

• 10+ years of total software/data engineering background, with 3+ years dedicated to Platform Engineering or Data Infrastructure.
• 3+ years leading complex, cross-team architecture and infrastructure initiatives at a Staff level.
• Hands‑on technical expertise designing, provisioning, and managing cloud environments on any of the public clouds like AWS, GCP, Azure (We primarily use AWS)
• Experience with infrastructure automation tools like Terraform, CloudFormation, etc. (we primarily use Terraform)
• Proven track record designing and automating robust CI/CD pipelines using tools like, Github Actions , Jenkins. (We primarily use Github actions)
• Intermediate level experience with at least one of the programming languages: Python, Go, Java, Scala. (we primarily use Python)
• Working knowledge of Docker.
• Intermediate level experience with SQL
• Experience implementing monitoring and observability frameworks (preferably for data pipelines)
• A demonstrated willingness to learn and adapt to new technologies and tools.
• Strong communication skills, both written and verbal - you’ll be collaborating closely with people in multiple time zones.
• Ability to work independently and in a team, with a proactive approach to improving developer experience and engineering processes.

Preferred qualifications

• 3+ years of experience building & maintaining scalable data infrastructure with strong focus on automation and reliability
• Interest / Experience in building developer-facing automation agents, internal CLI tools, or platform productivity integrations.
• Experience ‘managing’ ETL orchestration platforms such as Airflow, Dagster, etc. (we primarily use Airflow)
• Familiarity with dbt (Data build tool), used for building data pipelines
• Familiarity with Data Governance and security compliance best practices

What does our stack look like

• Infrastructure (AWS, Docker, Terraform)
• CICD (Github Actions)
• Data Pipeline and Orchestration (Snowflake, dbt, Astronomer Managed Airflow)
• Monitoring and Observability (DataDog, MonteCarlo)

Please note that Zendesk can only hire candidates who are physically located and plan to work from Karnataka or Maharashtra. Please refer to the location posted on the requisition for where this role is based.

Hybrid: In this role, our hybrid experience is designed at the team level to give you a rich onsite experience packed with connection, collaboration, learning, and celebration - while also giving you flexibility to work remotely for part of the week. This role must attend our local office for part of the week. The specific in‑office schedule is to be determined by the hiring manager.

The intelligent heart of customer experience

Zendesk software was built to bring a sense of calm to the chaotic world of customer service. Today we power billions of conversations with brands you know and love.

Zendesk believes in offering our people a fulfilling and inclusive experience. Our hybrid way of working, enables us to purposefully come together in person, at one of our many Zendesk offices around the world, to connect, collaborate and learn whilst also giving our people the flexibility to work remotely for part of the week.

As part of our commitment to fairness and transparency, we inform all applicants that artificial intelligence (AI) or automated decision systems may be used to screen or evaluate applications for this position, in accordance with Company guidelines and applicable law.

Zendesk is an equal opportunity employer, and we’re proud of our ongoing efforts to foster global diversity, equity, & inclusion in the workplace. Individuals seeking employment and employees at Zendesk are considered without regard to race, color, religion, national origin, age, sex, gender, gender identity, gender expression, sexual orientation, marital status, medical condition, ancestry, disability, military or veteran status, or any other characteristic protected by applicable law. We are an AA/EEO/Veterans/Disabled employer. If you are based in the United States and would like more information about your EEO rights under the law, please click here.

Zendesk endeavors to make reasonable accommodations for applicants with disabilities and disabled veterans pursuant to applicable federal and state law. If you are an individual with a disability and require a reasonable accommodation to submit this application, complete any pre‑employment testing, or otherwise participate in the employee selection process, please send an e‑mail to [e-mail] with your specific accommodation request.