Principal Data Engineer

Optum is seeking a Principal Data Engineer to lead the design, construction, and operation of data‑intensive systems that scale across cloud platforms. This hybrid role in Eden Prairie, MN emphasizes delivering robust data pipelines with strong governance, CI/CD practices, and data-centric collaboration across teams. A bachelor’s degree in engineering or equivalent experience is required, with a minimum of two years of relevant experience, and the position carries a salary range of USD 112,700 to 193,200 per year.

Responsibilities

• Collaborate with product owners, system analysts, and engineering teams to deliver data solutions aligned with an Agile roadmap
• Work with data architects and platform engineers to translate functional and non‑functional requirements into scalable data architectures
• Serve as a technical leader and primary point of contact for scrum teams, guiding and influencing solutions across teams and mentoring junior engineers
• Design, build, test, and operate data‑intensive systems, including streaming and batch pipelines using Databricks, Kafka, Snowflake, and cloud‑native storage
• Develop and maintain ETL/ELT pipelines, data transformations, and orchestration workflows using Python, SQL, and distributed processing frameworks
• Implement and continuously improve CI/CD, DevOps, and DataOps practices to enable reliable, automated deployments of data pipelines and analytics workloads
• Build and maintain configuration management, infrastructure automation, deployment strategies, and monitoring/observability tools for data platforms
• Apply software and data engineering best practices, including reliability engineering, fault‑tolerant architecture, performance tuning, and automated testing
• Participate in incident management processes, root‑cause analysis, and remediation using ServiceNow
• Define and implement data quality, governance, security, and resilience strategies to ensure trusted and compliant data products
• Support data solutions throughout the full SDLC, from design and development through production deployment and operational support
• Participate in design reviews, architecture discussions, code reviews, defect triage, and performance optimization efforts
• Adhere to established data modeling, coding, and platform standards, while continuously improving how data solutions are built and delivered

Requirements

• Bachelor's degree in engineering or equivalent experience
• 5+ years of experience designing and implementing cloud‑based data solutions on Azure, Google Cloud, or AWS
• 5+ years of experience with modern data and platform technologies, including Azure Databricks, Apache Kafka (or equivalent streaming platforms), Snowflake, GitHub and GitHub Actions
• 2+ years of hands‑on experience with Python and/or Scala for data engineering workloads
• Solid proficiency in SQL for data querying and transformation, plus a strong understanding of version control, CI/CD pipelines, and automated deployment practices for data platforms
• Proven ability to collaborate effectively within Agile, distributed, and onshore/offshore teams

Technologies

• Databricks
• Apache Kafka
• Snowflake
• GitHub
• GitHub Actions
• Python
• Scala
• SQL
• Azure
• Google Cloud
• AWS
• ServiceNow
• Large Language Models (LLMs)
• Retrieval Augmented Generation (RAG)
• RESTful APIs

Benefits

• Comprehensive benefits package
• Incentive and recognition programs
• Equity stock purchase
• 401k contribution

Preferred Qualifications

• Relevant cloud certifications, particularly Microsoft Azure certifications such as Azure Data Engineer Associate or Azure Solutions Architect Expert
• Experience within the healthcare industry
• Firsthand experience with AI techniques and frameworks, such as Large Language Models (LLMs), Retrieval Augmented Generation (RAG), or autonomous agents
• Working knowledge of RESTful APIs and data integration patterns
• Thorough understanding of data modeling techniques (conceptual, logical, and physical) and deep knowledge of data warehousing architectures and best practices
• Proven excellent analytical and problem‑solving skills, with the ability to think creatively and deliver innovative data solutions in collaboration with delivery teams

Application timeline

This posting will remain live for a minimum of two business days or until a sufficient candidate pool has been collected. The job posting may be removed earlier due to the volume of applicants.