Lead Data Engineer

Mastercard•Arlington, VA

5d•$161,000 - $266,000•Hybrid

About The Position

Mastercard’s Data Commercialization Platform team is seeking a Lead Data Engineer to design, build, and scale cloud-native data and Business Intelligence solutions across a modern multi-cloud data ecosystem. The role focuses on Databricks, Snowflake, and AWS, while helping drive a multi-cloud architecture across AWS and Azure to enable secure, governed interoperability across platforms, compute engines, and cloud providers. The position combines hands-on engineering with technical leadership to deliver scalable, reliable, secure, and cost-effective solutions. It is hybrid and based in Arlington, Virginia, with three days per week onsite.

Requirements

Deep hands-on experience as a Lead or Senior Data Engineer designing and building enterprise-scale cloud data, analytics, and BI platforms.
Strong expertise with Databricks, Snowflake, and AWS, including AWS S3, Glue, EMR, and IAM.
Advanced proficiency with Apache Spark/PySpark, Delta Lake, SQL, and Python for large-scale data processing and analytics.
Experience building scalable ETL/ELT pipelines, data integration frameworks, and distributed data solutions.
Experience designing multi-cloud data architectures and integrations across AWS and Azure.
Strong experience with CI/CD, Infrastructure as Code, automation, Git/GitHub, and DevOps practices for data platforms.
Experience implementing enterprise security, governance, and access controls, including RBAC, IAM, service principals, data lineage, metadata management, and observability.
Knowledge of modern and open data architectures and formats, including Delta Lake and Apache Iceberg.
Understanding of FinOps and cloud cost optimization, performance, and scalability for large-scale data workloads.
Ability to lead technical design and architecture decisions, drive complex engineering initiatives across teams, and mentor engineers.
Strong communication and stakeholder management skills, including the ability to articulate technical decisions, trade-offs, risks, and recommendations.
Bachelor’s degree in Computer Science, Engineering, Information Systems, or a related STEM discipline, or equivalent practical experience.

Nice To Haves

Experience with Azure Databricks and ADLS Gen2.

Responsibilities

Design and develop cloud-native data and BI solutions using Databricks and Snowflake on AWS.
Build scalable, high-performance data pipelines and analytics frameworks supporting enterprise data products.
Drive implementation of multi-cloud architectures across AWS and Azure, including Azure Databricks and ADLS Gen2.
Enable integration and interoperability across Databricks, Snowflake, AWS services, and Azure services.
Build and maintain CI/CD pipelines, automation frameworks, and Infrastructure as Code for reliable platform provisioning and deployment.
Implement secure and governed access patterns using RBAC, IAM, service principals, and enterprise identity integration.
Design reusable platform capabilities for data interoperability across multiple compute engines and cloud providers.
Establish engineering standards for development, testing, deployment, monitoring, documentation, and operational excellence.
Optimize data platforms and workloads for performance, scalability, reliability, resiliency, and cost efficiency.
Lead technical design reviews and influence architecture and platform engineering decisions.
Partner with Product, Architecture, Engineering, Data, and Business teams to translate requirements into scalable, sustainable technical solutions.
Provide technical leadership and mentorship to engineers and drive initiatives from design through implementation.
Abide by Mastercard’s security policies and practices, protect the confidentiality and integrity of accessed information, report suspected security violations or breaches, and complete mandatory security training.

Benefits

Medical, prescription drug, dental, vision, disability, and life insurance.
Flexible spending account and health savings account.
Paid leaves, including 16 weeks of new parent leave and up to 20 days of bereavement leave.
80 hours of Paid Sick and Safe Time.
25 days of vacation time and 5 personal days, prorated based on date of hire.
10 annual paid U.S. observed holidays.
401(k) with a company match.
Deferred compensation for eligible roles.
Fitness reimbursement or on-site fitness facilities.
Tuition reimbursement eligibility.
Competitive base salary; the successful candidate may be eligible for an annual bonus or commissions depending on the role.