Data Architect

USP • Rockville, MD

12d • $112,700 - $146,900

About The Position

This is a hands-on non-supervisory strategic position responsible for leading the end-to-end data architecture strategy—bridging data ingestion, transformation, governance, and analytics—to ensure that data is accessible, high-quality, secure, and performant across the enterprise. The role will define and deliver data architectures and solutions as well as contribute to the development, alignment, and implementation of IT plans in line with the overall strategy of IT and the business. As part of our mission to advance scientific rigor and public health standards, you will play a vital role in increasing global access to high-quality medicines through public standards and related programs. USP prioritizes scientific integrity, regulatory excellence, and evidence-based decision-making to ensure health systems worldwide can rely on strong, tested, and globally relevant quality standards. Additionally, USP’s People and Culture division, in partnership with the Equity Office, invests in leadership and workforce development to equip all employees with the skills to create high-performing, inclusive teams. This includes training in equitable management practices and tools to promote engaged, collaborative, and results-driven work environments.

Requirements

• Bachelor’s degree in Computer Science, Information Systems, or related field, or equivalent combination of education and experience.
• Eight (8) years of experience working in Information Technology.
• Five (5) years of experience in data architecture, engineering, or cloud data solutions, including a minimum of two (2) years on AWS.
• Ability to relate architectural decisions and recommendations to business needs.
• Strong analytical thinking and problem-solving ability.
• Excellent communication skills and ability to explain complex technical concepts to non-technical stakeholders.
• Proactive, detail-oriented, and passionate about building scalable, reliable, and efficient data systems.
• Team player with a mindset of continuous learning and innovation.
• Proven experience designing and maintaining a data lakehouse or modern data platform architectures on AWS.
• Hands-on experience with: AWS S3 (data lake design, partitioning, lifecycle management). AWS Glue (ETL jobs, crawlers, Data Catalog, schema management). AWS Redshift (data warehousing, performance tuning, Redshift Spectrum). AWS Lambda and Step Functions (data processing orchestration). MWAA / Apache Airflow (workflow management). AWS Athena (ad hoc querying). AWS SageMaker (data preparation for ML pipelines).
• Strong proficiency in SQL, Python, and data modeling (dimensional, data vault, etc.).
• Experience with data governance, lineage, metadata management, and cataloging frameworks.
• Familiarity with CI/CD pipelines, infrastructure as code (e.g., CloudFormation or Terraform), and DevOps principles.
• Familiarity with data reporting/visualization tools (e.g., Power BI or Tableau).

Nice To Haves

• Experience managing the iteration, review and maintenance of data requirements and data models.
• Experience developing reference architecture, principles, and standards.
• Demonstrated ability to apply data architecture design patterns and principles, including: o Domain-driven design and data mesh concepts. o Event-driven and microservices-based data integration patterns. o Modern data modeling and data pipeline orchestration best practices. o Scalability, reliability, and performance optimization strategies.
• Derives an overall strategy of master data management, within an established information architecture, that supports the development and secure operation of information and digital services.
• Sets standards for data modelling and design tools and techniques, advises on their application, and ensures compliance.
• Develops organizational policies, standards, and guidelines for data management, aligned with ethical principles.
• Takes overall responsibility for planning effective data storage, security, quality, sharing, availability, retention, and publishing within the organization.
• Plans, establishes, and manages processes for regular and consistent access to, and independent validation of external information from multiple sources.

Responsibilities

• Lead the data design of solutions for large projects and programs; through expert knowledge translate high-level business requirements into data models and appropriate metadata, test data, and data quality standards.
• Lead and support IT initiatives in developing and management of the USP Data Lakehouse.
• Lead and support USP analytics team in designing and curating data from a Data Lake for business intelligence dashboards.
• Lead and support the architecting of USP’s cloud-enabled data platforms and services including data warehouse, systems of record and operational databases.
• Direct and manage USP’s enterprise data landscaping efforts.
• Work with senior business stakeholders to secure engagement for the solution and ensure that the delivery of the project aligns with longer-term strategic roadmaps.
• Simplify the existing data architecture, delivering reusable services and cost saving opportunities in line with the policies and standards.
• Lead collaborative team working with other areas within IT to ensure that all solutions are complete, operable, conform to business processes, and meet the business needs with the agreed quality of service.
• Provide clear, continuous, and consistent data architecture leadership at a detailed level within projects.
• Lead and participate in the peer review and quality assurance of project architectural artifacts across the Enterprise Architecture group through governance forums.
• Report key architecture decisions and implications to the governance forums.
• Expected to carry out core accountabilities with minimal level of supervision for complex tasks and no supervision for more routine matters.
• Develop conceptual, logical, and physical data models to support data analysis and business intelligence.
• Create and maintain current- and target-state data architectures.
• Define and manage standards, guidelines, and processes to ensure data quality.
• Ensure technology solutions are in alignment with data architecture principles and target state.
• Evaluate and recommend emerging technologies for data management, storage and analytics.
• Define and implement data governance frameworks, including data lineage, cataloging, and data quality monitoring.
• Ensure data compliance with security, privacy, and regulatory requirements (e.g., GDPR, HIPAA, etc.).
• Collaborate with security teams to apply IAM roles, encryption, and access control policies.

Benefits

• USP provides the benefits to protect yourself and your family today and tomorrow.
• From company-paid time off and comprehensive healthcare options to retirement savings, you can have peace of mind that your personal and financial well-being is protected.

What This Job Offers

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