Lead Data Engineer: Azure Databricks, PySpark & Spark

Cognizant; Las Vegas (NV); On-site; USD 120,000 - 135,000; Full time

Benefits offered by this job

Medical/Dental/Vision/Life Insurance

Paid holidays plus PTO

401(k) plan and contributions

Long-term/Short-term Disability

Paid Parental Leave

Employee Stock Purchase Plan

Job summary

Cognizant is seeking a Lead Data Engineer to design and build scalable data pipelines using Azure Databricks, Spark, and PySpark. You’ll lead end-to-end data engineering solutions from design through production, optimizing workloads for performance, reliability, and cost.

You will mentor engineers, establish coding standards, and collaborate with architects, product teams, and stakeholders to turn data into actionable insights in a fast-paced environment.

Qualifications

• 13+ years of total experience with DW space.
• 5+ years hands-on Azure Databricks experience.
• Deep expertise in Spark / PySpark, Python, and SQL.
• Experience building large-scale ETL/ELT data pipelines.
• Strong understanding of data modeling and distributed data processing.
• Experience with performance tuning and Databricks cluster optimization.
• Knowledge of Delta Lake, ADLS, Unity Catalog, CI/CD, and Azure DevOps is a plus.
• Strong communication skills and ability to mentor teams.

Responsibilities

• Design and build scalable data pipelines using Azure Databricks, Spark, and PySpark.
• Lead end-to-end data engineering solutions from design through production.
• Optimize Spark workloads, clusters, and jobs for performance, reliability, and cost.
• Integrate data from multiple sources into analytics-ready datasets.
• Build strong data quality, monitoring, and validation into every pipeline.
• Establish coding standards, reusable frameworks, and engineering best practices.
• Partner with architects, product teams, and business stakeholders to solve data challenges.
• Mentor engineers through design reviews, code reviews, and technical guidance.
• Explore new Databricks and Spark capabilities and bring best ideas into production.

Skills

Azure Databricks

Spark

PySpark

Python

SQL

Data modeling

CI/CD

Azure DevOps

Tools

Delta Lake

ADLS

Unity Catalog

Job description

Cognizant is seeking a Lead Data Engineer to design and build scalable data pipelines using Azure Databricks, Spark, and PySpark. You’ll lead end-to-end data engineering solutions from design through production, optimizing workloads for performance, reliability, and cost.

You will mentor engineers, establish coding standards, and collaborate with architects, product teams, and stakeholders to turn data into actionable insights in a fast-paced environment.