Staff Data Architect: Platform & AI Readiness

Midwest Startups; Lehi (UT); Hybrid; USD 140,000 - 190,000; Full time

Benefits offered by this job

Healthcare plans

401(k) matching

HSA

Parental leave

Unlimited PTO

Paid holidays

Wellness reimbursement

Job summary

Opiniion is seeking a Staff Data Architect to own the data platform end-to-end, including ingestion, modeling, governance, and analytics access. You will collaborate with the Staff Software Architect to shape the new platform while evolving the current data foundation, making deliberate tradeoffs for coexistence during the transition.

The role requires a deep data modeling mindset, hands-on design orientation, and the ability to drive platform-level decisions across a Databricks-based stack

Qualifications

• 10+ years in data eng or data architecture, incl. 7+ years in leadership
• Deep expertise in modern cloud data platforms such as Databricks or Snowflake
• Strong background in data modelling (dimensional, lakehouse, data vault)
• Experience designing statistical models to support analytics and decision making
• Hands-on with ETL/ELT tools and orchestration (dbt, Airflow, Fivetran)
• Proficiency in SQL and Python; experience with Spark/PySpark
• Experience designing data governance including quality, lineage, access control
• Familiarity with BI/semantic tools (Omni, Looker, Tableau)
• Knowledge of cloud infra (AWS/GCP/Azure) and security/compliance frameworks
• Exposure to AI/ML data readiness is a strong plus
• Excellent communication; bias for action; collaborative leadership

Responsibilities

• Own the architecture of the data platform, including ingestion, transformation, storage and BI layers
• Partner with Staff Software Architect to drive platform architecture and rollout
• Balance legacy data platform with the new platform during transition
• Architect data foundations to scale for growing data volume and analytics demand
• Own canonical data models, schema design, and architecture standards
• Design correlation, causation, and statistical models for insights
• Lead platform decisions across the data stack based on Databricks
• Architect data pipelines feeding BI tools and AI/ML use cases
• Establish data quality, governance, and lineage practices
• Translate reporting needs into scalable data architecture with stakeholders
• Mentor data engineers through design reviews and documentation
• Evaluate data tools and platform investments; build vs. buy decisions
• Support AI/ML initiatives with well-modeled data foundations

Skills

Databricks Delta Lake

Data modelling

SQL / Python

Cloud platforms

Architectural leadership

Data governance

Education

Bachelor's or higher in CS/related field

Tools

dbt

Airflow

Fivetran

Looker / BI tools

Job description

Opiniion is seeking a Staff Data Architect to own the data platform end-to-end, including ingestion, modeling, governance, and analytics access. You will collaborate with the Staff Software Architect to shape the new platform while evolving the current data foundation, making deliberate tradeoffs for coexistence during the transition.

The role requires a deep data modeling mindset, hands-on design orientation, and the ability to drive platform-level decisions across a Databricks-based stack