Data Engineer Lead – Data Engineer
About Distillery
Distillery is a global technology consulting firm that partners with innovative companies to build high-quality software solutions. We specialize in assembling elite, distributed engineering teams that work closely with our clients to solve complex business challenges.
At Distillery, we value craftsmanship, ownership, and continuous learning. Our teams are empowered to make technical decisions, collaborate openly, and deliver real impact. We work with modern technologies, cloud-native architectures, and data-driven organizations across multiple industries.
About the Role
We are seeking an experienced Data Engineer Lead to join a product development team focused on complex application initiatives and large-scale data migrations.
In this role, you will lead data engineering execution across data integrations, migrations, and modeling efforts, ensuring solutions align with architectural standards and production-quality expectations. You will work in an agile environment, contributing hands-on to pipeline development while guiding best practices in data quality, testing strategy, and continuous delivery.
This position is ideal for a senior data professional who is passionate about building reliable data systems, solving complex migration challenges, and shipping production-grade software.
Key Responsibilities
Data Engineering Leadership
- Lead data engineering execution in support of complex application development initiatives
- Ensure data integrations, pipelines, and models align with established architectural standards
- Guide best practices in data quality, validation, reconciliation, and testing
- Collaborate closely with cross-functional engineering teams in an agile environment
Data Migrations & Modeling
- Design, build, and execute data migrations between systems
- Perform schema analysis, data mapping, transformation, validation, and reconciliation
- Ensure data accuracy and completeness across environments
- Resolve data quality issues during migration efforts
- Model data structures to support scalable, production-grade applications
Pipeline & API Development
- Develop and maintain production data pipelines, APIs, and data management tools
- Build scripts and services for data movement and validation
- Support the full software lifecycle: design, deployment, testing, monitoring, and operations
- Contribute to continuous delivery practices for pipelines and schema deployments
Quality, Testing & Performance
- Define and advocate for strong data quality standards
- Contribute to test automation strategies for pipelines and migrations
- Ensure performance, security, and scalability of data services
- Apply best practices around JSON, REST APIs, and data validation
Required Qualifications
Experience
- 7+ years of experience in Data Engineering or related data-focused roles
- Strong background delivering production-grade data pipelines and migration projects
- Experience leading data engineering initiatives within product development environments
- Passion for shipping and maintaining production software products
Technical Skills
- Strong proficiency in Python, with a history of delivering production pipelines
- Real-world experience with SQL and NoSQL systems
- Strong expertise in SQL Server and MongoDB
- Experience modeling data, analyzing source/target schemas, and writing complex queries
- Experience building production services for data movement and validation
- Hands-on experience with Azure data services (Azure Data Factory, Azure Data Lake, Microsoft Fabric, Tabular Models/DAX) or comparable technologies
Tools & Practices
- Experience with Git and distributed version control systems
- Familiarity with automated pipeline and schema deployments into production environments
- Experience working in agile teams and applying continuous delivery principles
- Strong opinions and practical experience around data quality, test strategies, and automation
Education
- BS in Computer Science or equivalent practical experience
Soft Skills
- Strong verbal and written communication skills
- Detail-oriented with a focus on simplicity and quality
- Analytical problem-solver who thrives in fast-moving environments
- Service-oriented mindset with a collaborative approach
Why You Should Work at Distillery
- Lead high-impact data migration and product engineering initiatives
- Work on complex, production-grade systems that demand precision and architectural rigor
- Collaborate with experienced engineers in a culture that values quality and craftsmanship
- Influence technical direction and data architecture standards
- Join a remote-first environment that emphasizes autonomy, collaboration, and continuous growth