SOVRN Creative

Director, Data Collective

Boulder, Colorado · Director

Sponsorship not specified$225k-$250kDetected 27 days ago

PythonDistributed SystemsCode ReviewGitDatabricksVector DatabasesAWSCloud PlatformsTerraformCI/CDDatadogPlatform EngineeringRESTKafkaMachine LearningSparkData EngineeringData ScienceLLMsRAGA/B TestingIncident ResponseComplianceForecasting

About the role

This is a hands-on engineering leadership role.
You'll be working with a strong senior team, a modern stack, and an organization that already uses LLMs and agentic tooling across the data stack.

Responsibilities

Own the skill mix of the Data Collective team; lead hiring and performance management for engineers ranging from mid-level to Principal
Set the technical and cultural standards for the team: what "great" looks like in design, code review, on-call, and cross-team partnership
Mentor and grow engineers across levels through hands-on design collaboration, technical coaching, and clear career frameworks
Partner with the broader engineering leadership team on org-wide planning, budgeting, and roadmap tradeoffs; represent the team's work and constraints to executives
Drive architectural decisions across pipeline design, data modeling, lakehouse architecture, and data services layers
Heavily contribute to the design and architecture of Sovrn's data pipelines, lakehouse, and data services: high-throughput streaming, always-on batch, petabyte-scale storage and query
Lead design reviews and set technical standards across the team; raise the bar on engineering rigor, observability, and operational excellence
Set the team's direction on AI-native data engineering: where LLMs, RAG, agentic workflows, and AI-assisted tooling create real leverage in a high-throughput adtech environment, and where they don't
Own the infrastructure cost footprint of the Data Collective across AWS and Databricks; drive structural cost improvements through architecture, and disciplined commitment management
Drive Infrastructure as Code (IaC) adoption, policy-as-code, governance frameworks (RBAC/ABAC, IAM, SCIM), and CI/CD for infrastructure across the team

Requirements

10+ years of software / data engineering experience, with a strong hands-on track record in data platforms, distributed systems, or backend infrastructure
4+ years leading and growing engineering teams, including hiring, leveling, and performance management of senior and principal-level engineers
Deep, current technical proficiency.
Hands-on experience in big data and distributed data processing in the AWS ecosystem (Python, Spark, Kafka/Redpanda, Databricks or similar lakehouse platforms)

Nice to have

Track record of leading or substantially contributing to AI / agentic engineering efforts in production, not just experimentation, but shipped, operated, and iterated on
Hands-on experience operating production vector databases at scale, including the pipelines and infrastructure to refresh hundreds of millions of vectors on a daily cadence
Experience with data security and compliance (PII, CCPA, GDPR)
Ability to clearly communicate architectural concepts and team strategy at multiple levels, from engineers to executives to the board
Comfort driving technical and organizational decisions in ambiguous, fast-moving environments

Skills

Python, Redpanda/Kafka, Databricks/Spark, AWS/S3, Terraform, Datadog, GitHub
Languages / components / tools in our stack: Python, Redpanda/Kafka, Databricks/Spark, AWS/S3, Terraform, Datadog, GitHub

Compensation

The base salary for this position is $225,000 to $250,000 annually.

Benefits

In addition to salary, the total compensation package includes bonus and equity.
Make sure the team is investing in the right balance of new capability, platform health, and tech debt
Actual base salary will depend on the candidate's education, experience, skills, and location.

Company info

We believe in the freedom and free-flow of information.
We believe the Open Web is the largest source of this information.
We believe in helping Open Web businesses be and remain Independent.
the pipelines, lakehouse, data services, and cloud infrastructure that power our exchange, our products, and our customers' decisions.
You'll own team composition and hiring; lead architecture and design across the platform; and remain close enough to the code, the systems, and the tradeoffs to make real technical decisions, not just approve them.
We're looking for a leader who can take what's working from "in use" to "intentional practice." Someone with strong opinions about what high-leverage AI-native data engineering looks like at exchange scale, and the credibility to bring the rest of the org along.
Heavily contribute to the design and architecture of
Establish standards for how the team evaluates, trusts, and operates
internal teams, leadership, and external customers of our Data-as-a-Service products

Equal opportunity

Employer: Sovrn is proud to be an Equal Opportunity Employer and provides equal employment opportunities to all employees and applicants regardless of race, color, religion, gender, gender identity, age, national origin, disability, parental or pregnancy status, marriage and civil partnership, sexual orientation, veteran status, or any other characteristic protected by law. Reasonable accommodations will be made to meet the requirements of the Americans with Disabilities Act.
Recruitment Agencies: Sovrn does not accept agency resumes. Please do not forward resumes to our jobs alias or Sovrn employees. Sovrn is not responsible for any fees related to unsolicited resumes.
Employer: Sovrn is proud to be an Equal Opportunity Employer and provides equal employment opportunities to all employees and applicants regardless of race, color, religion, gender, gender identity, age, national origin, disability, parental or pregnancy status, marriage and civil partnership, sexual orientation, veteran status, or any other characteristic protected by law.
Reasonable accommodations will be made to meet the requirements of the Americans with Disabilities Act.

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