Senior Databricks Architect — Remote Data Modernization

Cognizant; Boston (MA); Remote; USD 150,000 - 230,000; Full time

Job summary

Cognizant is seeking an experienced Databricks Architect to lead enterprise data modernization initiatives. You will design and implement scalable Databricks Lakehouse architectures, drive migrations from legacy systems, and guide data governance and security strategies across cloud-native AWS environments.

Ideal candidates have deep Databricks, Spark, Delta Lake expertise and a proven track record shaping data architectures in large-scale environments.

Qualifications

• 12+ years of Data Engineering/Data Architecture experience.
• 5+ years of hands-on Databricks Architecture experience.
• Strong expertise in Databricks Lakehouse, Spark, Delta Lake, Unity Catalog, and Databricks SQL.
• Experience with AWS cloud (S3, IAM, networking, security) and large-scale migrations.
• Excellent stakeholder management and communication skills.
• Experience with data governance, security, and compliance frameworks.

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 Cloud

Data governance

Data migration

Stakeholder management

Tools

Terraform

Snowflake

Job description

Cognizant is seeking an experienced Databricks Architect to lead enterprise data modernization initiatives. You will design and implement scalable Databricks Lakehouse architectures, drive migrations from legacy systems, and guide data governance and security strategies across cloud-native AWS environments.

Ideal candidates have deep Databricks, Spark, Delta Lake expertise and a proven track record shaping data architectures in large-scale environments.