Senior Data Engineer, GMS Data Team
About The Position
Planet is seeking a Senior Data Engineer to own, architect, and build production, enterprise-scale data ecosystems using modern cloud technologies for mission-critical, customer-facing products. The role partners with cross-functional stakeholders to translate complex requirements into robust, scalable solutions, and delivers end-to-end data systems spanning architecture, implementation, CI/CD, orchestration, automated QA, and integration into production systems. The engineer will be a senior member of the Data Team within Software Engineering, alongside data scientists, engineers, and analysts. The position focuses on the architecture and evolution of data systems supporting Planet’s global monitoring products, which provide persistent, high-cadence monitoring and active intelligence, particularly for Defense and Intelligence customers. The engineer will collaborate with Product and Engineering leadership to ensure customers have the data needed for global security and rapid decision-making. This is a full-time hybrid role requiring work from Planet’s Arlington, Virginia office three days per week.
Requirements
- 6–8 years of relevant data engineering experience with a track record of technical leadership.
- Bachelor’s degree in a relevant field.
- Expertise designing and implementing end-to-end data architectures for global-scale, customer-facing solutions, with a focus on data integrity and efficiency.
- Expert-level proficiency in Python and SQL for complex ETL/ELT pipeline construction, including event-driven data architectures.
- Proactive, self-starter mindset and ability to lead problem-solving initiatives in a dynamic, high-stakes environment.
- Exceptional communication skills and ability to translate between technical execution and high-level business requirements.
- Deep experience maintaining enterprise-grade, peer-reviewed codebases and advanced CI/CD workflows using GitLab CI, Docker, and Kubernetes.
- Experience with cloud-native architectures; GCP is preferred.
- Significant experience tuning storage formats such as Parquet to achieve sub-second query performance for consumers.
Nice To Haves
- Experience using modern data tooling such as dbt for pipeline inputs to customer-facing production systems.
- Experience using Infrastructure as Code tooling such as Terraform to manage cloud architecture.
- Experience architecting solutions for geospatial datasets.
- Knowledge of earth observation and/or satellite operation concepts.
Responsibilities
- Architect and oversee robust, high-availability data pipelines.
- Establish standards for maintaining, troubleshooting, and optimizing existing data ecosystems.
- Collaborate with global product, commercial, and engineering leads and peers to design and execute a long-term data strategy for products in scope.
- Provide high-level mentorship and conduct technical design reviews.
- Maintain architectural integrity across the Data Team and set standards for code quality.
- Design and build end-to-end data solutions, including architecture, implementation, CI/CD, orchestration, automated QA, and production integration.
Benefits
- Comprehensive medical, dental, and vision plans.
- Health Savings Account (HSA) with a company contribution.
- Generous paid time off, holidays, and company-wide days off.
- 16 weeks of paid parental leave.
- Wellness Program and Employee Assistance Program (EAP).
- Home office reimbursement.
- Monthly phone and internet reimbursement.
- Tuition reimbursement and access to LinkedIn Learning.
- Equity.
- Commuter benefits for employees local to an office.
- Paid volunteer time off.
- The role may be eligible for discretionary short-term and long-term incentives, including bonus and equity.
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What This Job Offers
Job Type
Full-time
Career Level
Senior
