Cloud Solution Architect – Data & Analytics

Cloud Solution Architect – Data & Analytics

First Quality was founded in 1989 and has grown to be a global privately held company with over 4,000 employees. Its corporate offices are located in Great Neck, New York, with manufacturing facilities and offices in Pennsylvania, South Carolina, Georgia, and Canada. First Quality is a diversified family of companies manufacturing consumer products ranging from Absorbent Hygiene (adult incontinence, feminine care, and baby care), Tissue (bath and towel), and Industrial (print and packaging materials), serving institutional and retail markets throughout the world. First Quality focuses on private label and branded product lines.

We are seeking a Cloud Solution Architect – Data & Analytics for our First Quality Enterprises located remotely. 

The Enterprise Data and Analytics team provides strategic direction, technical/functional expertise, and product management for First Quality’s Data and Analytics systems and Machine Learning applications.  The Cloud Solution Architect – Data & Analytics, as a key member of the Enterprise Data and Analytics team, provides functional and technical leadership for the definition, design, and delivery of First Quality’s Analytics systems. This position is responsible for architecture, product management, and delivery of analytics systems. 

The Cloud Solution Architect – Data & Analytics is responsible for maintaining standards and best practices for enterprise Analytics tools and solutions.  The incumbent will design and develop reporting frameworks of varied levels of complexity working directly with end users and other Solution Architects to create reporting requirements, design patterns, and implementations. The person in this role will interact with all areas of First Quality to define business requirements, scope solutions, develop specifications, and delivery of solutions. This position is the go-to contact for their assigned Analytics system specialization and, as such, serves as the ultimate support escalation point for their assigned system(s). The person in this position owns their assigned system(s) and interacts with all divisions within First Quality. This position will be held accountable for the training, education, and execution of Analytics systems with the goal to fully utilize their capabilities. 

Primary responsibilities include:

• Design and implement data architecture, integration, ETL and analytics solutions on Azure and future state cloud platforms.
• Collaborate with business stakeholders, data engineers, and data scientists to understand data requirements and design scalable and flexible data models.
• Develop data ingestion strategies and frameworks to efficiently capture and integrate data from various sources into Azure and other cloud data services.
• Define data storage and retrieval mechanisms, including multi-tenant data partitioning, indexing, and compression, to optimize performance and cost efficiency.
• Create and maintain data pipelines and ETL/ELT processes to transform, cleanse, and integrate data across different data sources.
• Implement data governance and data management practices to ensure data quality, consistency, and compliance with relevant regulations.
• Collaborate with security and compliance teams to establish and enforce data security measures, including data encryption, access controls, and data masking.
• Perform data profiling, analysis, and troubleshooting to identify and resolve data-related issues.
• Stay up to date with the latest advancements in Cloud data services and recommend innovative solutions to enhance data architecture capabilities.
• Provide technical guidance and mentorship to junior team members and promote best practices in data architecture design and implementation.
• Identify technical areas for improvement and present detailed business cases for improvements or new areas of opportunities.
• Work with external and internal teams to resolve infrastructure-related issues when developing integration modules.
• Partner with the business teams to evaluate and perform application development and/or business process change requests under minimal direction.
• Work with IT functional leads to understand the application architecture and setup right integration mechanisms.
• Implement DevOps practices and CI/CD pipelines across all analytic systems.
• Ability to communicate complex ideas in simple terms, and effectively interact with decision makers.
• Knowledge of machine learning and AI technologies and their integration with data architecture
• May need to travel to manufacturing sites and other First Quality locations to address IT analytics needs

The ideal candidate should possess the following:

• Bachelor’s degree in computer science, Information Technology, Engineering, or a related field.
• Extensive experience in designing and implementing data architecture and analytics solutions on Azure and other cloud platforms.
• Strong proficiency in Azure data services such as Azure SQL/MI, ADF, Azure Synapse, ADLS, Azure Databricks etc.
• Deep understanding of data modeling principles and experience with relational, dimensional, and NoSQL data modeling techniques.
• Solid knowledge of ETL/ELT processes, data integration patterns, and data warehouse concepts.
• Experience with any visualization tools (QlikView, Tableau, Power BI etc.)
• Experience with data governance, data security, and compliance practices in Azure and other cloud platforms.
• Prior experience in the Manufacturing Industry preferred.
• Proficiency in SQL and programming languages such as Python or Spark.
• Strong problem-solving and analytical skills with the ability to troubleshoot and resolve complex data-related issues.
• Excellent communication and collaboration skills to work effectively with stakeholders at all levels.
• Ability to manage multiple projects and priorities in a fast-paced and dynamic environment.