Sr. Data Architect

Overview

Your Future. Secured. ISC2 is a force for good. As the world’s leading nonprofit member organization for cybersecurity professionals, our core values — Integrity, Advocacy, Commitment, Inclusion, and Excellence — drive everything we do in support of our vision of a safe and secure cyber world. Our globally recognized, award-winning portfolio of certifications provide an independent and globally recognized endorsement of cybersecurity knowledge, skills and experience for all career levels. Our charitable arm, the Center for Cyber Safety and Education, enables ISC2 and our members to serve the public by educating the most vulnerable about cyber risks and empowering access to enter and thrive in the cyber profession. Learn more at ISC2 online and connect with us on Twitter, Facebook and LinkedIn. When you join ISC2, you’ll demonstrate your commitment to an inclusive and equitable environment. Your support of the unique perspectives and experiences shared by our global cybersecurity workforce and profession will be recognized. We invite you to take an active role in helping us create a true sense of belonging across our organization — an environment of authenticity, trust, empowerment and connectedness that empowers all of our successes. Learn more.

Position Summary

The Senior Data Architect is the enterprise’s authoritative leader for data architecture, governance, and data activation. With a data strategy and governance framework now established, this role is accountable for turning strategy into execution—operationalizing governance, maturing data practices, and advancing the data lake into a governed, insight-driven, activation-ready platform.

This leader oversees the Data team (DBA and Data Engineer) and will define the next phase of the organization’s data ecosystem—powering enterprise analytics, CDP activation, personalization, segmentation, AI/LLM enablement, marketing automation, reporting, and secure data use across the customer/member lifecycle.

Success means shifting data from a passive asset to a scalable, trusted, revenue- and experience-driving capability.

**This position is not available to residents of California.**

Responsibilities

Data Governance & Policy Ownership

• Own, operationalize, and enforce the enterprise-wide data governance framework, standards, and stewardship model.
• Define policies for classification, access, retention, lineage, and lifecycle management.
• Lead or co-lead governance forums to drive adoption and accountability.
• Ensure compliance with GDPR, CCPA/CPRA, and privacy/security standards.

Data Architecture Strategy & Execution

• Define and maintain the enterprise data architecture roadmap across warehouse, lake, CDP, Fabric, and analytical platforms.
• Advance the data lake into a governed, curated, high-quality platform optimized for analytics and activation.
• Architect conceptual, logical, and physical data models aligned to business needs.
• Guide storage and architecture decisions (relational, dimensional, NoSQL, event-driven, lakehouse, etc.).

Data Enablement for Analytics, CDP & Personalization

• Partner with CX, Marketing, Product, and Technology teams to enable:
• Segmentation & audience modeling
• Personalization & progression marketing
• Marketing automation & orchestration
• CDP activation & identity resolution
• Ensure data quality, availability, lineage, and readiness for reporting and advanced analytics.

Enterprise Collaboration & Governance Influence

• Serve as the primary architectural authority for data across CRM, LMS, ERP, ecommerce, CMS, CDP, BI, and marketing technologies.
• Collaborate closely with Security, Architecture, Applications, and Infrastructure teams to ensure secure and resilient data use.
• Represent data architecture in ARB/design authority processes.

Advanced Capabilities, LLMs & Self-Service Enablement

• Enable AI/ML and LLM use cases by ensuring governed, high-quality data pipelines and model-ready datasets.
• Partner with data science and product teams to support generative AI, recommendation engines, and predictive analytics.
• Lead the design and enablement of self-service analytics and data applications, empowering business users to securely access, explore, and activate data.
• Evaluate and introduce emerging data architecture patterns, automation, and governance tooling (e.g., Fabric, lakehouse, semantic models).

Perform other miscellaneous duties, as needed.

Behavioral Competencies

• High integrity in handling confidential data and regulatory requirements.
• Demonstrated passion for data and data-driven business models.

Management Responsibility

• Lead and mentor the DBA and Data Engineer to establish modern engineering practices.
• Oversee ingestion, transformation, pipelines, ETL/ELT, monitoring, and optimization.
• Manage lifecycle: provisioning, upgrade, archival, and decommissioning of data systems.

Qualifications

• Proven ability to operationalize data strategies, not just design them.
• Certifications in cloud, data architecture, or governance frameworks are an asset.
• Strong SQL expertise; familiarity with NoSQL and modern data architectures.
• Familiarity with LLM data requirements: grounding, retrieval, vectorization, data governance for AI/ML, and model readiness pipelines.
• Strong business acumen—able to translate strategy into data capabilities.
• Excellent stakeholder influence and communication skills.

Education and Work Experience

• Bachelor’s degree in Computer Science, Data Management, IT, or related field. Will consider candidates with a high school diploma and 10 years of experience in data architecture; 7 years in a lead or enterprise data architect role.
• 7+ years in data architecture; 5+ years in a lead or enterprise data architect role.
• Experience governing enterprise data models, MDM, metadata, and stewardship programs.
• Hands-on experience designing and governing data lakes, warehouses, and lakehouse architectures.
• Leadership or mentorship experience with data teams (engineers, DBAs, analysts).
• Experience with cloud platforms (Azure, AWS, or GCP).
• Experience with Microsoft Fabric, Power BI, or lakehouse architecture highly desirable.
• Programming experience (Python, Java, C#, etc.).
• Experience enabling self-service analytics platforms or applications (e.g., semantic models, governed datasets, business-friendly data access layers).
• Experience integrating data across CRM, ERP, LMS, ecommerce, CDP, or marketing ecosystems.
• Exposure to personalization, segmentation, progression marketing, or data activation workflows.
• Experience supporting AI/ML or LLM-driven solutions preferred.
• Experience with GDPR/CCPA and privacy-by-design.
• Experience in membership, association, or subscription-driven businesses, preferred.
• Experience with ecommerce data and digital experience analytics, preferred.

Physical and Mental Demands

• Ability to travel up to 10% of time, may also include overnight and international travel.
• Work normal business hours and extended hours when necessary.
• Remain in a stationary position, often standing or sitting, for prolonged periods.
• Regular use of office equipment such as a computer/laptop and monitor computer screens.
• Dexterity of hands and fingers to operate a computer keyboard, mouse, and other computer components.

Equal Employment Opportunity Statement

All qualified applicants will receive consideration for employment without regard to race, color, religion, age, sex, national origin, disability status, genetics, protected veteran status, sexual orientation, gender identity or expression, or any other characteristic as protected by applicable law. Job candidates will not be obligated to disclose sealed or expunged records of conviction or arrest as part of the hiring process.