Our ‘black belt’ specialists are leaders in their domains: digital champions, delivery-focused experts, top-tier security professionals, AI thought leaders, and engineering best practice advocates.
With a global footprint and deep local insight, Software at Scale delivers cutting-edge technology solutions that power mission-critical platforms. We solve complex engineering challenges at scale, driving quality, performance, and resilience through the strength of our people.
Empower Your Career
We’re seeking a highly proactive and deeply technical Chief Data Engineer to take the helm of our enterprise data initiatives. This is a wide-stretching, high-impact leadership role where you will run teams of data engineers while remaining heavily hands-on in the codebase.
You will act as the critical bridge between raw data engineering, data science, and artificial intelligence. We need a leader who can coach engineering squads on the core principles of data science and architect platforms specifically designed to make enterprise data AI-ready.
You are not just a people manager or a passive architect. You will actively assist with complex coding challenges, conduct rigorous code reviews, and work closely with senior business stakeholders to ensure every data project delivers measurable, commercial ROI.
Key Responsibilities
-
Engineering Leadership & Team Management: Run, scale, and lead high-performing teams of data engineers. Act as the ultimate point of technical escalation and operational delivery for the data engineering function.
-
Hands-On Execution & Code Quality: Maintain a deeply hands-on presence. Assist engineers with complex coding roadblocks, write production-grade code, and lead rigorous code reviews to enforce uncompromised engineering standards.
-
Data Science & AI Architecture: Architect scalable data science platforms. You must ensure the overarching data architecture actively supports machine learning and AI workloads, guaranteeing that enterprise data is structured, governed, and perfectly primed for AI consumption.
-
Coaching & Capability Uplift: Actively teach and mentor your teams. Upskill traditional data engineers on the key principles of data science, AI model requirements, and the critical architectural decisions that underpin modern data science platforms.
-
Stakeholder & ROI Management: Partner directly with senior stakeholders to define key requirements, scope deliverables, and rigorously track project outcomes to ensure every initiative delivers tangible commercial ROI.
-
Target-State Platform Design: Lead the design and evolution of modern, cloud-native data platforms that support high-volume, business-critical, and near-real-time data use cases.
-
Proactive Problem Solving: Autonomously identify pipeline bottlenecks, data quality issues, or process inefficiencies, thinking outside the box to engineer creative solutions to complex enterprise data challenges.
What You Bring
-
Chief-Level Leadership: Proven experience operating at a Head of Data Engineering or Chief Data Engineer level, with a track record of successfully running and scaling engineering teams.
-
Deep Hands-On Expertise: You are still a coder at heart. You possess advanced fluency in Python and SQL, alongside deep commercial experience with modern data stacks (e.g., Snowflake, dbt, Airflow, or Databricks).
-
Data Science & AI Acumen: A strong, practical understanding of data science principles and how to build platforms that support them. You know exactly what it takes to transform raw data into AI-ready assets.
-
Commercial & ROI Focus: Exceptional stakeholder engagement skills with a relentless focus on delivering business value and proving project ROI.
-
Coaching Mindset: A genuine passion for teaching, mentoring, and lifting the technical capability of the engineers around you.
-
Enterprise Architecture: Deep hands-on experience designing, building, and evolving enterprise-scale data platforms in complex, regulated, or large environments.
-
Communication: Strong communication skills and the ability to explain complex data science and engineering concepts clearly to both technical squads and non-technical executives.
What We Offer
- Meaningful, hands-on engineering leadership across complex, enterprise-grade data and AI platforms.
- The autonomy to run your own teams and shape the technical direction of the data practice.
- A low-ceremony, delivery-focused environment that values leaders who proactively own outcomes.
- Competitive remuneration and benefits.
- The opportunity to work alongside highly experienced engineers, architects, and delivery leaders on high-impact systems.
