Staff Data Architect: Scale Data Platform for AI

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

Job summary

Opiniion is seeking a Staff Data Architect to own the architecture of our data platform end to end, shaping ingestion, modeling, governance, and analytics readiness across the company. You’ll partner with the Staff Software Architect to drive a cohesive data and application platform strategy as we scale.

You’ll balance evolving the current data foundation with building the next generation, making deliberate tradeoffs, and mentoring data engineers to deliver scalable, trustworthy data for BI and

Qualifications

• 10+ years of experience in data engineering or data architecture.
• 7+ years in an architect or technical leadership capacity.
• Deep expertise in Databricks (Delta Lake, Unity Catalog) or similar cloud data platform.
• Strong background in data modeling methodologies (dimensional modeling, lakehouse, data vault).
• Experience designing statistical, correlation, and causation models for analytics.
• Hands-on experience with ETL/ELT tools and orchestration (dbt, Airflow, Fivetran).
• Proficiency in SQL and Python, with distributed processing (Spark/PySpark).
• Experience designing data governance frameworks (data quality, lineage, access control).
• Familiarity with BI/semantic tools (Omni, Looker, Tableau).
• Cloud infrastructure knowledge (AWS, GCP, Azure); security/compliance awareness (SOC 2).
• Exposure to AI/ML data readiness: feature pipelines, vector stores, or RAG-enabled data architectures is a plus.
• Excellent communication skills to translate tradeoffs for non-technical stakeholders.
• Bias for action and continuous improvement mindset; co-ownership of technical direction.

Responsibilities

• Own the architecture of the data platform, including ingestion, transformation, storage, and semantic/BI layers.
• Partner with the Staff Software Architect to drive the architecture and rollout of the new platform.
• Balance ownership of current data platform with architecting the new one during transition.
• Design and implement scalable data foundations to support growing volume and analytics demand.
• Lead platform decisions across the data stack; establish governance, lineage, and quality standards.
• Mentor data engineers through design reviews, documentation, and hands-on support.
• Evaluate data tools and platform investments; make build vs. buy calls.
• Support AI/ML initiatives with well modeled, accessible data foundations.

Skills

Data architecture

Data modeling

SQL

Python

Communication

Cloud platforms

ETL/ELT

Data governance

Spark/PySpark

BI tooling familiarity

Tools

Databricks

Delta Lake

Unity Catalog

dbt

Airflow

Fivetran

Looker

Omni

Tableau

Job description

Opiniion is seeking a Staff Data Architect to own the architecture of our data platform end to end, shaping ingestion, modeling, governance, and analytics readiness across the company. You’ll partner with the Staff Software Architect to drive a cohesive data and application platform strategy as we scale.

You’ll balance evolving the current data foundation with building the next generation, making deliberate tradeoffs, and mentoring data engineers to deliver scalable, trustworthy data for BI and