Senior Integration Specialist

AAM - American Axle & Manufacturing•Detroit, MI

About The Position

American Axle & Manufacturing Inc is seeking a Senior Integration Specialist to design, build, and maintain data pipelines, API ecosystems, and streaming architectures that connect systems across the enterprise. The role supports reliable real-time and batch data flows between internal services and third-party platforms, drawing on expertise in API integration, event-driven streaming, ETL/ELT processes, data platforms, and databases. The specialist designs and publishes RESTful and GraphQL APIs, manages API gateways and security flows, and integrates SaaS platforms, microservices, and internal applications. The role also builds and monitors streaming pipelines, develops and orchestrates ETL/ELT workflows, applies data quality controls, and supports cloud data platforms and relational and NoSQL databases. Working with software engineers, data engineers, and architects, the specialist translates integration requirements into technical solutions and participates in Agile/Scrum planning and reviews. The position also contributes to incident response and root-cause analysis and maintains runbooks, architectural diagrams, and integration documentation.

Requirements

3–5 years of professional experience in integration engineering, data engineering, or a closely related software engineering role.
Proficiency in at least one backend language used for integration work, such as Python, Java, or PLSQL.
Strong understanding of RESTful API design principles, HTTP semantics, and API security standards.
Demonstrated experience building and maintaining streaming data pipelines with Kafka, Kinesis, or equivalent technologies.
Hands-on ETL/ELT experience with at least one major orchestration platform, such as Informatica, Talend, or ODI.
Working knowledge of at least one cloud data warehouse or lakehouse platform.
Solid command of SQL across relational databases.
Experience with Docker and familiarity with CI/CD pipelines for integration artifacts.
Ability to read and produce clear technical documentation, data flow diagrams, and API contracts.

Nice To Haves

Experience with GraphQL API design and federation patterns.
Familiarity with schema registries and data serialization formats such as Avro or JSON Schema.
Exposure to data mesh or data fabric architectural patterns.
Relevant AWS, Azure, or GCP certifications in data or integration services.
Prior experience with iPaaS platforms such as MuleSoft or Informatica.

Responsibilities

Design, build, and publish RESTful and GraphQL APIs following OpenAPI/Swagger standards.
Develop and maintain API gateway configurations, authentication flows, and rate-limiting policies.
Integrate third-party SaaS platforms, microservices, and internal applications using synchronous and asynchronous communication patterns.
Maintain API documentation, versioning strategies, and deprecation policies.
Build and maintain real-time streaming data pipelines using platforms such as Apache Kafka, Confluent, or AWS Kinesis.
Monitor streaming pipeline health, manage topic configurations, and tune consumer and producer performance.
Use stream processing frameworks to transform, aggregate, and enrich in-flight data.
Design and implement ETL and ELT pipelines across operational and analytical systems, and orchestrate data workflows.
Handle incremental loads, change data capture (CDC), and full-refresh strategies.
Implement data quality checks, validation frameworks, and alerting to preserve data integrity.
Work with cloud data platforms and optimize relational database queries and NoSQL stores.
Collaborate with data architects on schemas suited to OLTP and OLAP workloads.
Participate in database performance tuning, index strategies, and query optimization.
Partner with software engineers, data engineers, and architects to translate integration requirements into technical solutions.
Participate in design reviews, code reviews, and sprint planning in an Agile/Scrum framework.
Contribute to incident response, root-cause analysis, and post-mortems for integration failures.
Maintain runbooks, architectural diagrams, and integration inventories.