Senior Staff Data Architect, Foundational Data (Remote)

airbnb, Inc.; Northern (KY); Hybrid; USD 248,000 - 310,000; Full time

Job summary

Airbnb, Inc. is seeking a Senior Staff Data Engineer for Foundational Data. You will lead the data architecture, own long-term strategies, and build datasets across cost, utilization, performance, and AI tooling.

This is a hands-on leadership role with no direct reports, but high influence across Infrastructure and Finance teams. You will design macro data models, own unit economics for AI training/serving, and mentor engineers while staying close to pipelines and models to ensure reliability

Qualifications

• 12+ years of industry experience with a BS/MS, or 9+ years with a PhD.
• Production data pipelines at large scale using SQL and Python.
• Able to design a dimensional model and define trusted metrics.
• Led technical direction while coding and delivering results.
• Able to explain data models to finance and engineering partners.

Responsibilities

• Provide technical leadership across data engineering and analytics engineering work.
• Define and own the multi-year data strategy and architecture for Airbnb's foundational data assets.
• Own how Airbnb measures its AI, including unit economics and tooling costs.
• Design and build datasets that integrate signals across infrastructure fleets.
• Stay hands-on in pipelines and models you architect, catching issues early.
• Coach a distributed team and raise quality through design reviews and automation.
• Navigate conflicting stakeholder requirements and unify a single definition.
• Identify duplication and deprecation to reduce data fragmentation.
• Participate in the team's on-call rotation for owned datasets.

Skills

SQL

Python

Dimensional modeling

Data pipelines

Technical leadership

Cross-functional collaboration

Education

BS or MS in data engineering or related field

PhD in data engineering or related field

Tools

Airflow

Job description

Airbnb, Inc. is seeking a Senior Staff Data Engineer for Foundational Data. You will lead the data architecture, own long-term strategies, and build datasets across cost, utilization, performance, and AI tooling.

This is a hands-on leadership role with no direct reports, but high influence across Infrastructure and Finance teams. You will design macro data models, own unit economics for AI training/serving, and mentor engineers while staying close to pipelines and models to ensure reliability