Senior Director - Data Engineering & Machine Learning

Modus Create

19h•Remote

About The Position

At Modus Create, we empower the world’s most ambitious companies through thoughtful, modern, data-driven digital solutions. As Senior Director of Data Engineering & Machine Learning, you’ll help shape the future by leading inclusive, collaborative teams that architect and scale data platforms, and deliver intelligent AI/ML-powered products. Our work drives transformative outcomes across healthcare, finance, life sciences, automotive, and beyond. We’re seeking a strategic, hands-on leader with a passion for mentoring others, who bridges deep technical expertise with business-driven vision—someone who can shape data and ML strategy, guide clients through transformation, and empower a new generation of data leaders. As Senior Director, you’ll guide and empower a global, distributed team of Data Engineering and ML practitioners. You’ll bring deep data and machine learning experience, a consulting mindset, and a strong commitment to improve both our craft and our client outcomes. This role reports to a VP of Product Engineering Services and works cross-functionally with Growth, Operations, and Partnerships to scale our data capabilities. You'll play a key role in creating a culture where people feel seen, supported, and motivated to do their best work.

Requirements

Empathetic Leader: 15+ years in data or software engineering roles, with 7+ years leading Data Engineering/ML teams—ideally at scale or in global consulting contexts.
Technical Depth: Hands-on experience with cloud data platforms, big data toolchains (Spark, Kafka), data transformation tools (Airflow, dbt), and ML platforms.
Business Savvy: Success in pre-sales, solutioning, and growing data/ML engagements within enterprise or mid-market accounts.
Builder and Mentor: Demonstrated ability to create enablement programs, uplift team capabilities, and grow inclusive, high-performing engineering cultures.
Client-Centric: Deep empathy for client pain points and the ability to craft and deliver impactful, measurable solutions.
Communicator & Collaborator: Excellent across technical, executive, and cross-functional settings, with an ability to successfully navigate diverse cultural differences.

Responsibilities

Build Modern Data Platforms
Design and oversee architecture for cloud-native data platforms, pipelines, and streaming systems on AWS, Azure, or GCP.
Ensure robust solutions using platforms such as Databricks, Snowflake, Redshift, BigQuery, Spark, Kafka, Airflow, dbt, and Kubernetes.
Deliver Products that are Intelligent
Define and drive responsible ML strategy, from model development to integration, using platforms like SageMaker, Azure ML, or TensorFlow.
Enable smarter client experiences by embedding ML into applications, automation, and analytics.
Lead & Grow Teams
Foster a culture of trust, continuous learning, and experimentation by hiring, mentoring, and empowering distributed teams of data and ML engineers.
Define career paths, feedback frameworks, and learning programs grounded in a culture of experimentation,continuous growth, and a sense of belonging at every level.
Shape Technical Strategy & Best Practices
Develop modular runbooks, tooling standards, and engineering frameworks optimizing for scalability, observability, and security.
Champion collaborative practices like Agile/Lean development, dataOps, MLOps, and CI/CD for data pipelines and models.
Business Development & Sales Enablement
Partner with Sales, Partnerships, and Account Teams to find and co-create thoughtful, outcome-driven data & ML engagements.
Translate client needs into solution designs, shareable collateral, and winning proposals and estimates that reflect both technical strength and business empathy.
Serve as a technical leader in pitches, RFPs, and client workshops, establishing Modus as a trusted data, AI, and ML advisor, while building client confidence through clarity and consultative engagement.
Cross-Functional Collaboration
Work with product, design, platform, and engineering teams on integrated, end-to-end data solutions.
Translate capabilities into human impact by aligning closely with both client technical and business stakeholders.

Benefits

Remote work with flexible working hours
Flexible Time Off/PTO
Premium Health Insurance (medical, vision, and dental)
Other benefits such as FSA and HSA
401 (k)
Modus Global Office Programme: for when you want to get out of your home, we offer on-demand access to private offices, meeting rooms, coworking spaces and business lounges in locations in over 120 countries.
Employee Referral Program
Travel according to client or team needs
The chance to work side-by-side with thought leaders in emerging tech
Access to more than 12,000 courses with a licensed Coursera account.
Possibility to obtain paid certification/courses if they align with company goals and are relevant to the employee's role
Additional benefits might apply contingent on your location.