Manager, Data Engineering

Bigcommerce; United States; Remote; USD 150,000 - 250,000; Full time

Job summary

Commerce is seeking an AI-first Data Engineering Manager to lead the Enterprise Data team. You’ll own Snowflake- and Airflow-based platforms for reporting, analytics, and data products, while building a team that treats AI agents as first-class teammates in data engineering.

This hands-on leadership role requires shipping production pipelines, coaching engineers, and embedding agentic tools into daily workflow, with strong emphasis on quality and cost efficiency.

Qualifications

• 7+ years in data engineering and 3+ years of leadership.
• Hands-on Snowflake and Apache Airflow in production, with tuning and cost control.
• Experience with distributed teams across time zones.
• Strong SQL and Python; ability to review or write pipeline code.
• Experience with modern ELT tooling alongside Snowflake and Airflow.
• Experience using AI coding assistants or agentic tools in engineering workflows.
• Mentoring engineers and product-oriented data governance and security knowledge.

Responsibilities

• Lead, mentor, and grow a data engineering team, including hiring and performance management.
• Own the technical roadmap and architecture for Enterprise Data platform on Snowflake with Airflow.
• Embed AI-first tooling (e.g., Claude Code) into pipeline development, testing, and code review.
• Upskill engineers in agentic data engineering, including autonomous data quality checks and self-healing pipelines.
• Collaborate with Analytics, Data Science, Product, and stakeholders to turn data needs into reliable data products.
• Set standards for quality, observability, lineage, and cost efficiency across Snowflake/Airflow.
• Drive modernization of pipelines and evaluate new data/AI tooling to stay cutting edge.
• Establish scalable design reviews, incident response, and documentation practices.
• Report on team health, delivery, and platform reliability to leadership.

Skills

Team leadership

Snowflake

Apache Airflow

SQL

Python

Data governance

Data security

Communication

ELT tooling

AI coding assistants

Education

Bachelor's degree in CS/Engineering

Tools

dbt

Fivetran/Airbyte

Claude Code

GitHub Copilot

Cursor

Snowflake CoCo

Airflow

Job description

Welcome to the Agentic Commerce Era

At Commerce, our mission is to empower businesses to innovate, grow, and thrive with our open, AI-driven commerce ecosystem. As the parent company of BigCommerce , Feedonomics , and Makeswift , we connect the tools and systems that power growth, enabling businesses to unlock the full potential of their data, deliver seamless and personalized experiences across every channel, and adapt swiftly to an ever-changing market. We believe in harnessing AI responsibly to unlock new possibilities, and we're looking for individuals who use it intentionally to solve problems, accelerate outcomes, and expand what's possible in their role. Our purpose is to help businesses confidently solve complex commerce challenges so they can build smarter, adapt faster, and grow on their own terms. If you want to be part of a team of bold builders, sharp thinkers, and technical trailblazers who shape the future of commerce, this is the place for you.

Commerce - the company behind BigCommerce, Feedonomics, and Makeswift is looking for an AI-first Data Engineering Manager to lead our Enterprise Data Engineering team. You'll own the roadmap for the Snowflake- and Airflow-based platforms that power reporting, analytics, AI and data products across the business, while building a team that treats AI agents as first-class teammates in the data engineering lifecycle.

This is a hands‑on leadership role for someone who has shipped production data pipelines, has led engineers before, and is genuinely energized by agentic workflows - not as a buzzword, but as a daily practice for how data gets built, tested, and monitored. You'll spend real time coaching your team on best practices in data engineering: pairing with coding agents, building and governing autonomous pipeline and quality agents, and raising the team's bar for speed and craft.

What you’ll do

• Lead, mentor, and grow a team of data engineers - hiring, onboarding, career development, and performance management
• Own the technical roadmap and architecture for Commerce's Enterprise Data platform, built primarily on Snowflake and orchestrated with Airflow
• Champion an AI-first way of working by embedding agentic tools (e.g., Claude Code) into the team's daily workflow for pipeline development, testing, documentation, and code review
• Coach and upskill engineers on agentic data engineering - designing agent-assisted or autonomous data quality checks, self‑healing pipelines, and LLM-powered data products - with clear guardrails, evaluation, and human‑in‑the‑loop review
• Partner with Analytics, Data Science, Product, and business stakeholders to translate data needs into reliable, well‑governed data products
• Set and enforce standards for data quality, observability, lineage, and cost efficiency across the Snowflake/Airflow estate
• Drive modernization of data pipelines and evaluate new data and AI tooling to keep the platform on the cutting edge
• Establish design review, incident response, and documentation practices that scale the team's impact without scaling headcount 1:1.
• Report on team health, delivery, and platform reliability to engineering and business leadership

Who you are

• 7+ years in data engineering, with 3+ years directly managing or leading a team of data engineers.
• Deep, hands‑on experience with Snowflake and Apache Airflow in production, including performance tuning, cost management, and workflow orchestration at scale.
• Experience working with distributed teams across time zones.
• Strong SQL and Python skills, and comfort reviewing or writing pipeline code alongside your team.
• Experience with dbt, Fivetran/Airbyte, or similar modern ELT tooling alongside Snowflake and Airflow.
• Real experience using AI coding assistants or agentic tools (e.g., Claude Code, GitHub Copilot, Cursor), Snowflake CoCo in a professional engineering workflow
• A track record of mentoring and developing engineers, including those more senior or specialized than you in a given area.
• Working knowledge of data modeling, data governance, and data security/compliance practices.
• Excellent communication skills - you can translate technical tradeoffs into business terms and back again.
• Bachelor's degree in Computer Science, Engineering, or a related field, or equivalent practical experience.

Nice to have

• Experience designing or operating agentic workflows: LLM‑driven pipeline monitoring, autonomous anomaly detection, RAG‑based data catalogs/search, or agent frameworks such as LangGraph, AutoGen, or MCP‑based tooling.
• Background in ecommerce, SaaS, or marketplace data (order, catalog, or customer data at scale).
• Experience building internal platforms or self‑service tooling that let analysts and other engineers move faster.
• Familiarity with cost governance and FinOps practices for cloud data platforms.

#LI-AP1 #LI-REMOTE

Pay Transparency: $150,000 - $250,000

Work Where You Thrive

Commerce is a remote‑first company. For team members in Austin, Atlanta, and London, we offer option