Manager, Data Platform Engineering

Strata Decision Technology; Chicago (IL); On-site; USD 155,000 - 175,000; Full time

Job summary

Strata Decision Technology in Chicago, IL is seeking a Manager of Data Platform Engineering to lead the data and analytics platforms centered on Snowflake. This is a hands-on leadership role requiring you to design, automate, operate, and troubleshoot critical platform components, while guiding a small team.

You will own Snowflake architecture, security, governance, cost management, and PostgreSQL operations, and collaborate with Security and Infrastructure to meet enterprise requirements.

Qualifications

• Deep hands-on Snowflake administration, security, performance, and cost control.
• Strong SQL skills with experience troubleshooting complex data workloads.
• Experience implementing least-privilege access, service identities, credentials management, and auditing.
• Strong AWS knowledge and cloud security concepts for data platforms.
• Experience with Terraform, Python, and Git-based CI/CD.
• Experience with dbt and data-transformation tooling.
• Working knowledge of PostgreSQL and relational databases.
• Incident response and production troubleshooting experience.

Responsibilities

• Own Snowflake architecture, roadmap, administration, and engineering standards.
• Configure and operate Snowflake compute, storage, networking, integrations, and platform services.
• Build automation with SQL, Python, and APIs to improve reliability.
• Maintain Git-based CI/CD for platform configuration and deployment.
• Lead a small team of database and platform professionals.
• Partner with Security and Infrastructure to align Snowflake with requirements.
• Improve auditability and access control across the data platform.
• Drive performance and cost optimization of Snowflake and related components.

Skills

Snowflake

SQL

AWS

Terraform

Python

dbt

PostgreSQL

Incident response

Team leadership

Security governance

Tools

Satori

Git CI/CD

Job description

As the Manager of Data Platform Engineering, you will lead the platforms that power our data and analytics capabilities, with Snowflake at the center. This is a hands‑on leadership role. You will lead a small team while personally designing, automating, operating, and troubleshooting critical platform components. You will own Snowflake architecture and operations across security, governance, administration, reliability, performance, and cost, while providing operational oversight for PostgreSQL.

Own and Evolve the Data Platform

• Own Snowflake architecture, roadmap, administration, and engineering standards.
• Configure and operate Snowflake compute, storage, networking, integrations, and platform services.
• Create reusable patterns, automation, and guardrails that enable teams to deliver safely and efficiently.
• Oversee AWS RDS PostgreSQL configuration, security, backup, and recovery for product applications.

Strengthen Security, Governance, and Access

• Design and automate least‑privilege security and access controls, including RBAC, service identities, credentials, privileged access, and the access lifecycle.
• Improve access‑management tools, including Satori and internal solutions.
• Partner with Security and Infrastructure to align Snowflake and PostgreSQL with enterprise requirements.
• Improve auditability of platform access, administrative activity, and policy compliance.

Drive Performance and Cost Efficiency

• Own Snowflake performance and cost management, optimizing warehouse sizing, workloads, concurrency, storage, and configuration.
• Diagnose complex query and workload performance issues with engineering teams.
• Implement monitoring, alerting, resource controls, cost attribution, and platform health metrics.

Build Automation and Engineering Practices

• Use Infrastructure as Code, including Terraform, to make platform configuration repeatable, reviewable, and auditable.
• Build automation with SQL, Python, and APIs to reduce manual administration and improve reliability and self‑service.
• Maintain Git‑based CI/CD practices for platform configuration and deployment.
• Establish practical standards for dbt and related data‑platform technologies.
• Maintain operational tooling, documentation, and runbooks.

Lead While Staying Hands‑On

• Lead, mentor, and develop a small team of database and platform professionals.
• Set technical direction and priorities while remaining directly involved in architecture, implementation, and troubleshooting.
• Serve as the senior escalation point for complex production issues and participate in a shared on‑call model.
• Lead cross‑functional initiatives through direct ownership and influence.
• Contribute to hiring and team development.

Drive Improvement and Modernization

• Identify opportunities to improve scalability, efficiency, and cost
• Support adoption of Snowflake, Microsoft Fabric, and modern data tools
• Partner to enable analytics, ML, and AI workloads
• Promote automation and standardization

What we're looking for:

• Deep hands‑on Snowflake expertise across administration, security, performance, cost optimization, automation, and production architecture.
• Strong SQL skills and demonstrated experience troubleshooting and optimizing complex data workloads.
• Experience implementing least‑privilege access, service identities, privileged access, credential management, access lifecycle controls, and auditing.
• Strong AWS experience and an understanding of the cloud infrastructure and security concepts surrounding modern data platforms.
• Experience with Infrastructure as Code (Terraform preferred), Python or similar automation languages, and Git‑based CI/CD.
• Experience working with dbt or similar modern data‑transformation tooling.
• Working knowledge of PostgreSQL or strong relational database fundamentals.
• Experience supporting production systems and participating in incident response and operational troubleshooting.
• Ability to set technical direction, implement solutions, and lead technical professionals.
• Strong communication, collaboration, and influence across engineering teams.
• Sound judgement balancing security, reliability, performance, cost, and productivity.

You'd really wow us if you have:

• Experience with Satori or similar data access‑management and security platforms.
• Experience with legacy SQL Server environments.
• Experience supporting data platforms used for analytics, machine learning, or AI workloads.
• Experience moving manually administered infrastructure toward automated self‑service.

Estimated Salary Range: $155,000 - $175,000

Actual salary will be determined based on factors including, but not limited to, skill set and level of experience. This salary range is a good faith estimate of base pay. Strata also provides discretionary variable pay programs based on role. In addition, Strata provides a comprehensive benefits package including retirement benefits, health and welfare benefits, paid time off, parental leave, life and accident insurance, and other voluntary and well‑being benefits.

Find Out More About Strata Benefits Here.

How we work:

Our preferred location for open roles is Chicago, IL. We value in‑person connection and regularly host on‑campus events to create meaningful opportunities for our team to build relationships and collaborate

Should you require a reasonable accommodation in completing this application, interviewing, completing any pre‑employment testing, or otherwise participating in the employee selection process, please reach out to [e-mail].

Here @ Strata…

Our culture is driven by our people solving problems together. We embrace learning, collaboration, and continuous career growth. Together, we lift our customers, our products, our company, and our community.

We believe that each of our team member's unique perspectives and experiences is what drives innovation and positive change. Our individual differences are what make us a more forward‑thinking organization. We foster a culture of inclusion, equity and belonging, regardless of race, religion, disability, sex, sexual orientation, gender identity or national origin.

Our Core Values:

• We connect with positive intent.
• We are helpful.
• We own it.
• We get better every day.
• We are humble.