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Nik Holland-Plum

@nikholland-plum

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Senior data engineer specializing in cloud-native data platforms, ETL/ELT, and analytics solutions.

United States

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What I'm looking for

I seek senior data engineering roles building cloud-native data platforms, emphasizing scalable pipelines, observability, data governance, and collaborative stakeholder delivery.

I am a senior data engineer with extensive experience modernizing legacy systems into cloud-native architectures, designing data pipelines, and building enterprise analytics solutions. I lead migrations to AWS, Snowflake, GCP, and Databricks, and develop transformations in Snowpark Python and SQL.

My work emphasizes reliability and observability: I have implemented monitoring frameworks that achieve 99%+ uptime, established DataOps and CI/CD practices, and optimized cloud resources for cost and performance. I also build BI applications and reporting pipelines using Streamlit, Power BI, and Django/Python components.

I enjoy mentoring and teaching—I've instructed software engineering cohorts and K–5 students—and I collaborate closely with stakeholders to translate business requirements into scalable technical solutions while ensuring governance, security, and operational documentation are in place.

Experience

Work history, roles, and key accomplishments

Current

System Engineer

Current

Colorado PERA

Sep 2023 - Present (2 years 6 months)

Leading Investment Modernization by migrating legacy on-prem systems to cloud-native architecture using AWS, Snowflake, and Ascend.io; building Snowpark and Streamlit-based data applications and PowerBI pipelines to support Investment, Accounting, and Data Steward teams while implementing governance and DataOps practices.

AWS Snowflake Snowflake Snowpark Python Streamlit Data Architecture Data Governance Power BI

Instructor

Turing School of Software & Design

Jun 2021 - May 2024 (2 years 11 months)

Co-led evening software engineering classes for 20+ students, teaching environment setup, Git/GitHub workflows, and programming fundamentals while developing and iterating curriculum and providing mentorship and feedback.

Teaching Curriculum Development Git GitHub Mentorship Python Classroom Management

Senior Consultant

CapTech

Jan 2022 - Sep 2023 (1 year 8 months)

Designed and implemented cloud-native ETL/ELT and event-driven data pipelines using AWS Kinesis, DMS, Lambda and Databricks; built OpenSearch-backed document stores for near real-time querying and implemented monitoring, cost optimization, dbt CI/CD, and Terraform for Snowflake infrastructure.

AWS Kinesis DMS AWS Lambda Databricks OpenSearch DBT Terraform Python CI CD

Data Engineer III

Pandora

Jun 2019 - Oct 2021 (2 years 4 months)

Modernized infrastructure by converting Java jobs to Scala and migrating workloads to GCP (Spark, Dataproc, Cloud Composer), delivering scalable enterprise analytics, 99%+ uptime through observability, and CI/CD for data applications while contributing Django/Python dashboard components.

GCP Spark Airflow Scala Python CI CD Django Observability

Instructor

Coding With Kids

Mar 2019 - Jun 2019 (3 months)

Taught programming fundamentals to grades 1–5 using Animatron, Scratch, and Python; developed lesson plans and managed classroom equipment for classes of up to 20 students to foster interactive learning.

Scratch Python Lesson planning Classroom Management Student Engagement Curriculum Adaptation

Program Specialist

Denver Public Schools

Aug 2007 - Jun 2018 (10 years 10 months)

Progressed to Program Specialist overseeing educational and enrichment programs, managing summer and holiday programs, opening a new site, and driving student engagement and staff development across district offerings.

Program Management Staff Development Operations Community Outreach Site Launch Student Engagement Program Evaluation