Remote Senior Data Engineer — Data Platform & ML

Kforce Inc; Carlsbad (CA); On-site; USD 150,000 - 230,000; Full time

Job summary

Kforce Inc. is seeking an experienced Senior Data Engineer in California to design and own end-to-end data architecture.

You will build ingestion pipelines for partner data and API integrations, operate a curated analytics layer, and enforce HIPAA-compliant governance while partnering across backend, ML, and product teams. You will implement robust data validation, lineage, and observability, leveraging tools like PostgreSQL, dbt, and cloud primitives on AWS.

Qualifications

• Bachelor's degree in Computer Science, Engineering, or related technical field.
• 8+ years of professional data engineering experience shipping production data systems end-to-end.
• Mastery of PostgreSQL: schema design, indexing, query tuning, partitioning, JSONB, extensions, and scale.
• Experience with file-based and API-based ingestion with data validation and lineage.
• Experience with dbt and modern data modeling patterns.
• Hands-on with cloud platforms (AWS) and data primitives.
• Experience with orchestration frameworks (Dagster/Prefect/Airflow).
• Data governance in HIPAA environments and PHI/PII protection.
• Experience with ML workflows and AI coding assistants.
• Strong Python for ingestion and tooling.

Responsibilities

• Design and own end-to-end data architecture including landing zone, ingestion pipelines, and curated analytics layer.
• Build ingestion pipelines for partner data (CSV/JSON/XML/HL7/X12) and REST/SFTP with schema validation and data lineage.
• Stand up and operate curated data layer to support analytics and ML without impacting production.
• Design and operate minimal toolset (storage, orchestrator, transformations, validation library).
• Enforce data governance for HIPAA-regulated environment: encryption, RBAC, audit logs, retention, de-identification.
• Collaborate with backend, ML, product, and clinical stakeholders to define data contracts and ensure data quality.
• Maintain feature data for ML models and embeddings (e.g., pgvector).
• Instrument observability: SLAs, data freshness, schema drift, quality metrics.
• Participate in Agile ceremonies: backlog grooming, sprints, demos, retros.

Skills

PostgreSQL

Data pipelines

Python

Airflow/Dagster

dbt

Cloud (AWS)

Data governance

HIPAA knowledge

Education

BS/BA in CS/Engineering

Tools

Dagster

Prefect

Airflow

Great Expectations/Pandera/Soda

S3

pgvector

Job description

Kforce Inc. is seeking an experienced Senior Data Engineer in California to design and own end-to-end data architecture.

You will build ingestion pipelines for partner data and API integrations, operate a curated analytics layer, and enforce HIPAA-compliant governance while partnering across backend, ML, and product teams. You will implement robust data validation, lineage, and observability, leveraging tools like PostgreSQL, dbt, and cloud primitives on AWS.