Senior Data Engineer (Azure)

USEReady Technology

About The Position

USEReady is a data and analytics firm that helps businesses turn data into a competitive advantage, partnering with cloud and data ecosystem leaders including Tableau, Salesforce, Snowflake, and Amazon Web Services. The Senior Data Engineer will serve as the technical lead for a client engagement and own an Azure data platform end to end. The role designs data sources and products, leads governance and cataloguing using Microsoft Purview, and maintains platform security, performance, and cost efficiency. The engineer will design Azure Data Factory orchestration, ADLS Gen2 layouts, Synapse Medallion layers, and Power BI semantic models. The role includes onboarding source systems, building reusable metadata-driven pipelines, modelling Gold data products, tuning Synapse Dedicated SQL Pool, and establishing data quality, governance, security, and FinOps practices. It also prepares governed Gold data for AI and LLM analytics use cases. The position is client-facing and involves requirements workshops, UAT, status reporting, and translating manual reporting into dashboards. The engineer sets CI/CD, code review, runbook, and documentation standards, reviews code, and mentors junior team members. Success requires ownership of engagement outcomes, clear communication of technical trade-offs, early stakeholder alignment, and firm UAT timelines.

Requirements

5–7 years of experience in data engineering, including 3+ years delivering on the Azure data stack.
Expertise in Azure Data Factory, including complex orchestration, REST sources with token or session authentication, pagination, error handling, and metadata-driven design.
Deep experience with Azure Synapse Dedicated SQL Pool, including MPP design, distribution and indexing strategy, performance tuning, and cost control.
Advanced T-SQL skills, including stored-procedure frameworks, SCD Type 1/2, incremental and MERGE patterns, and query-plan analysis.
Data modelling experience with Medallion architecture and Kimball dimensional modelling.
Power BI skills in semantic model design, advanced DAX, performance tuning, workspace and refresh management, and RLS.
Hands-on Microsoft Purview experience with Data Map, scanning, Unified Catalog, glossary, classifications, and lineage.
Knowledge of data governance fundamentals, including ownership and stewardship, metadata management, and PII classification.
Azure security knowledge, including Key Vault, Managed Identity, RBAC, and network basics.
CI/CD experience with GitHub or Azure DevOps for ADF and Synapse.
Experience leading client-facing delivery, including requirements, estimates, UAT, and status reporting with US stakeholders.

Nice To Haves

Microsoft Fabric experience with Lakehouse, Warehouse, and Data Factory for future migration paths.
Python/PySpark and Spark experience on Synapse or Databricks.
Azure Cost Management and FinOps practice.
Experience with HR, payroll, or finance data, and CRM and ERP API integrations.
GenAI/LLM integration on curated data.
Certifications such as DP-203, DP-700, DP-600, PL-300, AZ-305, or SC-400/Purview-related.

Responsibilities

Own end-to-end Azure data platform design, including ADF orchestration, ADLS Gen2 layout, Synapse Medallion layers, and Power BI semantic models.
Onboard source systems, including API review, Key Vault secrets, linked services, Bronze tables, parameterised incremental logic, Silver procedures, and Gold views.
Design reusable, metadata-driven ADF frameworks, including parent-child pipelines, watermark and CDC-style loads, and alerting.
Model Gold data products for HR, payroll, and finance analytics, including attrition, profitability, headcount, budget versus actual, and FinOps.
Tune Synapse Dedicated SQL Pool using distribution keys, clustered columnstore indexes, statistics, workload management, DWU scaling, and pause schedules.
Lead the data quality framework by agreeing rules with business owners and launching data quality reporting.
Lead Microsoft Purview rollout, including Data Map scans, ADF lineage, Unified Catalog governance domains and data products, business glossary, PII classifications and sensitivity labels, and data quality and health.
Establish catalog operating practices, including data owners and stewards, glossary approval workflows, access policies, and onboarding standards for new assets.
Own security and access practices, including Key Vault secret rotation, Managed Identity, Azure RBAC, least-privilege access to PII and payroll data, and Power BI RLS where needed.
Drive FinOps by tracking Azure spend through Cost Management exports and recommending savings.
Prepare governed, curated Gold data for AI and LLM analytics use cases.
Run requirements workshops and UAT with client business and IT stakeholders, and turn manual reporting into dashboards.
Set CI/CD standards for GitHub and ADF/Synapse deployments across environments, as well as code review, runbooks, and documentation.
Review code and mentor junior team members.
Own engagement outcomes, explain technical trade-offs to business and IT leaders, align stakeholders early, and establish firm UAT timelines.