Senior Snowflake Architect (Azure Ecosystem)

The Senior Snowflake Architect is a strategic leadership position responsible for the vision, design, and implementation of a scalable, high-performance data architecture on Snowflake within the Microsoft Azure environment. This role serves as the bridge between business objectives and technical execution, ensuring that enterprise-grade data structures are optimized for reliability, security, and cost-efficiency. You will lead the transition from raw data ingestion to refined, high-value insights, enabling the organization to manage massive volumes of customer data and enterprise KPIs with precision.

• Architectural Design: Define and maintain the end-to-end Snowflake architecture on Azure, ensuring high availability, multi-cluster elasticity, and optimal storage strategies.

• Data Pipeline Engineering: Design robust ingestion strategies for batch, real-time, and streaming data, utilizing Snowflake-native features like Snowpipe and Streams & Tasks.

• Ecosystem Integration: Oversee seamless integration with Azure services (ADLS Gen2, Azure Data Factory, Azure DevOps, and Power BI).

• Governance & Compliance: Implement comprehensive data governance frameworks covering data lineage, quality monitoring, and compliance with GDPR, HIPAA, and industry-specific regulations.

• Performance & Cost Optimization: Proactively monitor and tune Snowflake performance; manage virtual warehouse credit consumption to ensure maximum ROI and cost predictability.

• Security & Identity: Architect security protocols including Role-Based Access Control (RBAC), Row-Level Security (RLS), and end-to-end encryption within the Azure-Snowflake boundary.

• Experience: 10+ years in Data Architecture, with at least 4+ years of hands-on experience specifically designing enterprise-scale Snowflake environments.

• Azure Mastery: Deep expertise in the Azure Cloud ecosystem, specifically Private Link configurations, Azure Active Directory (Entra ID) integration, and ADLS Gen2.

• Data Modeling: Expert-level knowledge of diverse modeling techniques (Data Vault 2.0, Star Schema, Snowflake Schema) to support both analytical and operational workloads.

• Pipeline Development: Proficiency in SQL and Python/Java for Snowpark, along with experience in orchestration tools like Azure Data Factory or Airflow.

• Automation: Solid understanding of CI/CD practices for data (DataOps) using tools like Azure DevOps or GitHub Actions.

• Certifications: Snowflake Certified Architect and/or Microsoft Certified: Azure Solutions Architect Expert.

• Modern Data Stack: Experience with dbt (data build tool) for transformation and Snowflake's semantic layer implementation.

• Migration Experience: Proven track record of migrating legacy on-premise warehouses (e.g., Teradata, Netezza) or other cloud warehouses to Snowflake.

• Data Warehouse: Snowflake (Standard, Enterprise, and Business Critical editions).

• Cloud Provider: Microsoft Azure (ADLS, ADF, Azure Functions, Azure Private Link).

• Transformation & ETL: dbt, SQL, Snowpark, Azure Data Factory.

• Security & Governance: Microsoft Purview, Snowflake Horizon, Azure Key Vault.

• Visualization/BI: Power BI, Tableau, or Looker.

• Infrastructure as Code: Terraform or Bicep for Snowflake resource provisioning.

• Cross-Functional Collaboration: Partner with Security, DevOps, and Data Science teams to ensure the platform meets diverse technical requirements.

• Business Alignment: Translate complex technical limitations and opportunities into actionable insights for C-suite and business unit leaders regarding KPI reporting.

• Mentorship: Act as a Subject Matter Expert (SME), leading internal workshops and code reviews to elevate the technical capabilities of Data Engineers and Analysts.

• Strategic Roadmapping: Contribute to the long-term data strategy, evaluating new Snowflake features (e.g., Unistore, Native Apps) for business relevance.