Senior Databricks Architect - Remote Data Lakehouse Leader

Cognizant; Little Rock (AR); Remote; USD 170,000 - 210,000; Full time

Job summary

Cognizant is seeking an experienced Databricks Architect to lead enterprise data modernization initiatives on AWS, driving Databricks Lakehouse implementation and large-scale migrations. This role requires deep expertise in Spark, Delta Lake, and Unity Catalog, with a focus on scalable, secure architecture.

You will mentor engineers, establish governance and best practices, and collaborate with analytics and engineering teams to deliver robust data solutions while optimizing cost and performance.

Qualifications

• 12+ years of Data Engineering/Data Architecture experience.
• 5+ years of hands-on Databricks Architecture experience.
• Strong expertise in Databricks Lakehouse and Spark/PySpark.
• Experience with Delta Lake, Unity Catalog, and Databricks SQL.
• AWS Cloud experience and data governance/security knowledge.
• Experience designing enterprise data models and data integration patterns.

Responsibilities

• Design and implement enterprise-scale Databricks Lakehouse architecture.
• Lead data modernization and migration programs from legacy platforms to Databricks.
• Architect scalable ELT/ETL pipelines using Databricks, Spark, Delta Lake, and Python.
• Define data governance, security, lineage, and metadata management strategies using Unity Catalog.
• Design batch and real-time data processing solutions.
• Provide architecture guidance for cloud-native solutions on AWS.
• Collaborate with business, analytics, and engineering teams to define data strategies.
• Establish best practices for data quality, monitoring, performance tuning, and cost optimization.
• Create architecture standards, reference architectures, and technical documentation.
• Mentor data engineers and technical leads throughout the development lifecycle.
• Evaluate and recommend emerging technologies and AI/ML capabilities within the Databricks ecosystem.

Skills

Databricks Lakehouse

Apache Spark/PySpark

Delta Lake

Databricks Workflows

Unity Catalog

Databricks SQL

Python

SQL

AWS

Data modeling

Data governance

Stakeholder mgmt

Job description

Cognizant is seeking an experienced Databricks Architect to lead enterprise data modernization initiatives on AWS, driving Databricks Lakehouse implementation and large-scale migrations. This role requires deep expertise in Spark, Delta Lake, and Unity Catalog, with a focus on scalable, secure architecture.

You will mentor engineers, establish governance and best practices, and collaborate with analytics and engineering teams to deliver robust data solutions while optimizing cost and performance.