Data Governance Lead

dv01

2d•$190,000 - $220,000•Remote

About The Position

dv01 is seeking a Data Governance Lead to establish and mature data governance practices within the company. The role will focus on creating a deliberate framework to replace existing home-grown governance methods. Key priorities include defining data ownership and stewardship across data domains, maintaining a comprehensive data dictionary, implementing a data quality framework with measurable metrics, and ensuring compliance with data usage terms. This role is crucial for scaling AI and data products by ensuring the trustworthiness of underlying data through robust governance. The Data Governance Lead will collaborate with Data Engineering, Data Product Management, Data Analysts, Data Operations, Product, Commercial, and Legal teams. Initially an individual contributor role, the position has the potential to build a team as the function proves its value. The role requires a builder mentality, persistence, credibility, and clear direction to drive progress and remove governance as a constraint on scaling AI and data products.

Requirements

7+ years of expertise in data governance, data quality, or data management.
Proven experience in building data governance programs from the ground up.
Meticulous and exceptionally organized approach to data management.
Ability to track down data definition issues and ensure resolution.
Fluent in technical conversations, able to review SQL, interpret data models, and partner effectively with engineering teams.
Experience with hands-on governance and data quality using purpose-built tooling (e.g., BigQuery, dbt, Unity Catalog, Collibra, Alation).
Strategic understanding of the intersection of AI and data governance.
Proven track record of designing governance frameworks (quality, lineage, metadata, compliance) for scalable AI models.
Knowledgeable across core governance domains: ownership, stewardship, quality, lineage, metadata, classification, access, master/reference data.
Familiarity with key regulatory frameworks (GDPR, CCPA, EU AI Act / ISO 42001).

Nice To Haves

Experience managing data intended for external customer consumption.
Experience at a startup or startup-like environment.
Experience with structured finance and lending data.
Experience building scalable web applications using TypeScript, Soda and deal studio.

Responsibilities

Scale data governance for AI products across all datasets, clients, and new products.
Ensure data is owned, classified, measured, and trusted at the scale required by AI.
Own and define the Data Quality Framework and its associated metrics.
Set data quality thresholds and partner with relevant teams to instrument monitoring.
Report on data quality metrics and drive a sustained reduction in failures.
Establish named ownership and stewardship for all data domains.
Document data ownership decisions and ensure they remain current.
Own the Data Dictionary and ensure business definitions are correct, complete, and consistent across all platforms.
Chase down and resolve ambiguities in data definitions.
Own Data Rights, ensuring clarity on permitted data usage and making terms enforceable within the platform.
Manage commitments, escalate roadblocks, and ensure closure of governance-related tasks.
Build and maintain credibility and clear direction to drive the governance program forward.