Principal Data Architect

Job description

We are seeking a Principal Data Architect to serve as the leading technical authority for data architecture across our UK Consumer business. This is a senior individual contributor role for a highly experienced architect who combines deep technical expertise with strong ownership, commercial pragmatism and the ability to influence across multiple teams. This is a hands-on architecture role being actively engaged from strategy and design through implementation, adoption and optimisation, helping teams make confident decisions and deliver against a shared architectural vision.

You will define the strategic direction for our data ecosystem, shaping the target-state architecture while creating a practical roadmap from today's environment. Working across cloud platforms, data products, analytics, AI and operational systems, you will ensure our architecture enables innovation, scalability, governance and business value.

Key Responsibilities

Own the current-state, target-state and transition architecture for the enterprise data ecosystem. Define end-to-end architecture across data ingestion, transformation, storage, activation, analytics, AI and data products. Translate business and product objectives into scalable, secure and maintainable architectural solutions. Establish architecture principles, standards, reference patterns and governance frameworks that enable engineering teams to deliver efficiently.

Lead data modelling, data governance and standards for quality, lineage, metadata, ownership and lifecycle management. Provide technical leadership across cloud data platforms and technologies including Snowflake, AWS and associated integration and orchestration tooling. Define and evolve patterns for batch, real-time, event-driven and API-based data architectures. Lead complex transformation initiatives including cloud migrations, platform modernisation, data product adoption and legacy decommissioning.

Ensure architecture decisions balance scalability, resilience, security, observability, performance and cost efficiency. Influence and mentor engineers, architects and technical leaders while building strong alignment across UK and international teams.

Qualifications

Significant experience in Data Architecture, Data Engineering or Data Platform Architecture within large, complex organisations. Proven success operating at Principal, Lead Architect or equivalent senior architecture level across multiple domains and teams. Deep expertise in modern cloud data platforms, particularly AWS, Snowflake or comparable technologies. Strong experience designing large-scale batch, streaming, event-driven and API-based data architectures.

Advanced knowledge of conceptual, logical and physical data modelling and enterprise data design. Hands-on experience with modern data tooling such as dbt, Snowplow, Fivetran, orchestration platforms or equivalent technologies. Experience building and governing data products, self-service platforms and domain-oriented data architectures, with a strong understanding of Data Mesh and federated governance principles. Proven experience delivering large-scale data transformations, including cloud migrations, platform modernisation, legacy system retirement and operating model change.

Strong understanding of data security, privacy, governance, data quality, metadata, lineage, observability and data protection by design. Knowledge of the data foundations required for advanced analytics, personalisation, machine learning and Generative AI, combined with excellent stakeholder management, communication and influencing skills.

Preferred Experience

Telecommunications, digital products, e-commerce or large-scale consumer-facing environments.