AVP, Reference Data Governance

Fortitude Re • Jersey City, NJ

2d • Hybrid

About The Position

The AVP, Reference Data Governance is responsible for developing and managing enterprise frameworks for ontologies, taxonomies, and reference data to ensure consistency, accuracy, and alignment across business processes and systems. This role partners with governance, engineering, analytics, and business stakeholders to define common data standards, maintain controlled vocabularies, and support interoperability. Reporting to the VP, Data Governance, this position ensures data is standardized, well-structured, and discoverable to support compliance, operational efficiency, and advanced analytics. This role will be based in our Jersey City, NJ office on a hybrid basis.

Requirements

• Bachelor’s or Master’s in Information Management, Computer Science, Data Science, or related field.
• 8+ years of experience in data management, reference data, master data, or information architecture, with at least 3+ years in a leadership role.
• Deep understanding of ontology, taxonomy, and metadata management frameworks.
• Strong knowledge of reference/master data management tools and practices.
• Hands-on experience with metadata platforms (e.g., Alation, Databricks Unity) and semantic and data modeling standards
• Familiarity with regulatory and compliance requirements (e.g., SOX, GDPR) relevant to financial/insurance/reinsurance industries.
• Excellent collaboration, analytical, and communication skills, with ability to influence across technical and business stakeholders.
• Domain knowledge of insurance, reinsurance, or financial services is required.

Responsibilities

• Define and maintain ontologies, taxonomies, and semantic models with common definitions and vocabularies.
• Manage reference data standards, stewardship, and lifecycle governance across key domains.
• Align ontologies and reference data with industry standards to enable cross-domain interoperability.
• Embed reference data controls and validation rules in enterprise platforms.
• Ensure traceability and compliance with data governance standards.
• Partner across governance, engineering, and analytics to embed standards into data solutions.
• Promote data literacy and awareness of reference data practices across the organization.

What This Job Offers

• Job Type: Full-time
• Career Level: Mid Level