Data Infrastructure Engineer

About Us

Are you ready to transform lives through academic excellence, innovative research, strong community partnerships and economic opportunity? Kennesaw State University is one of the 50 largest public institutions in the country. With growing enrollment and global reach, we continue to expand our institutional influence and prominence beyond the state of Georgia. We offer more than 190 undergraduate, graduate, and doctoral degrees to empower over 50,000 students to become thought leaders, lifelong learners, and informed global citizens. Our entrepreneurial spirit, high-impact research, and Division I athletics draw students from throughout the region and from more than 100 countries across the globe. Our universitys vibrant culture, career opportunities, rich benefits, and values of respect, integrity, collaboration, inclusivity, and accountability make us an employer of choice. We are part of the University System of Georgia. We are searching for talented people to join Kennesaw State University in our vision. Come Take Flight at KSU!

Location

(Primary Location for Job Responsibilities) Our Kennesaw campus is located at 1000 Chastain Road NW, Kennesaw, GA 30144.

Our Marietta campus is located at 1100 South Marietta Parkway, Marietta, GA 30060.

Job Summary

Focuses on building and maintaining the data infrastructure including the extraction, loading, and staging of data from various data sources, both on-premises or in the cloud. Ensures the seamless and secure transfer of data, optimizing for performance, integration and reliability to enable subsequent data transformation and modeling processes for enterprise reporting and analytics.

Responsibilities

KEY RESPONSIBILITIES:

1. Develops, tests, and implements data pipelines to efficiently, securely, and reliably ingest data from various data sources into the enterprise data lake or data warehouse

2. Collaborates with data architects and data source SMEs to understand requirements and designs data pipelines accordingly

3. Develops and maintains robust data integrity checks, ensuring data accuracy, timeliness, and consistency

4. Utilizes cloud tools and custom scripts for validation, set up automated anomaly detection, and collaborates with stakeholders to align quality checks with data requirements

5. Enables integration of data from various data sources, such as databases, cloud services and APIs, to facilitate seamless data flow for enterprise and self-service reporting and analytics

6. Monitors and optimizes data pipelines, identifies and troubleshoots issues using tools such as Azure Monitor or similar system

7. Implements automated alerts and collaborates with architects to adopt best practices in pipeline design for enhanced performance

8. Maintains compliance with data security policies and regulations in the data infrastructure

9. Implements encryption, manage access controls, conduct security audits, and stay updated with security best practices to safeguard data integrity and privacy

10. Manages the storage structure within the data lake or data warehouse, optimizing resource utilization and ensuring efficient integration with data transformation and modeling processes

11. Supports senior technical staff in project planning and the development of standard operating procedures

12. Contributes to the establishment of best practices, ensuring project alignment with technical standards and organizational goals

13. Creates and regularly updates technical documentation for data pipeline processes

14. Ensures clear, comprehensive, and accessible documentation is available, covering all aspects of pipeline design, operation, and maintenance

Required Qualifications

Educational Requirements

High school diploma or equivalent

Required Experience

Five (5) years of related IT experience.

Preferred Qualifications

Preferred Educational Qualifications

An undergraduate or advanced degree from an accredited institution of higher education in Computer Science, Information Systems, Business Administration or related field

Preferred Experience

Experience working with reporting tools such as Power BI, Tableau, etc.

Previous work experience in Higher Education

Knowledge, Skills, & Abilities

ABILITIES

Commitment to continuous learning and staying updated with the latest trends and best practices in data engineering

Able to handle multiple tasks or projects at one time meeting assigned deadlines

KNOWLEDGE

Familiarity with data protection and privacy laws and regulations (i.e., FERPA, HIPAA, etc.)

Knowledge of various file formats used in data storage, like parquet, avro, csv, etc., and their implications on performance and storage

Understanding of cloud storage services, such as blob storage, data lakes, data lakehouses, and data warehouses

Understanding of data warehouse architecture patterns (e.g., Medallion Architecture, OBT, Materialized View Pattern, Star-Schema, etc.)

Knowledge of data warehousing principles, including data quality, data enrichment and standardization, and data modeling.

Knowledge of data warehouse architecture patterns, such as star schema, One Big Table (OBT), materialized view architecture, etc.

Knowledge of best practices in data pipelines orchestration

Knowledge of data security practices, including encryption/decryption, and compliance with data governance policies and guidelines

SKILLS

Excellent interpersonal, initiative, teamwork, problem solving, independent judgment, organization, communication (verbal and written), time management, project management and presentation skills

Demonstrated skills in relational databases (e.g., SQL Server, Oracle, MySQL, etc.)

Demonstrated skills in data engineering tools (e.g., Azure Data Factory, SSIS, Informatica, Pentaho, Oracle Data Integrator, etc.)

Skills in identifying bottlenecks in data pipelines and optimizing for efficiency and scalability

Skills in developing efficient and scalable data ingestion pipelines between cloud-based and on-premises data sources and destinations

Proficient with computer applications and programs associated with the position (i.e., Microsoft Office suite and other collaboration tools)

Proficiency with SQL and its variants (e.g., PL/SQL, T-SQL, etc.)

Proficiency in programming/scripting languages (e.g., Python, Java, PowerShell, etc.)

Proficiency in data engineering technologies and tools (e.g., Azure Data Factory, Apache Spark, Azure Synapse Analytics, Python, Airflow, etc.)

Strong attention to detail and organization skills

Strong customer service skills and phone and email etiquette

USG Core Values

The University System of Georgia is comprised of our 25 institutions of higher education and learning as well as the System Office. Our USG Statement of Core Values are Integrity, Excellence, Accountability, and Respect. These values serve as the foundation for all that we do as an organization, and each USG community member is responsible for demonstrating and upholding these standards. More details on the USG Statement of Core Values and Code of Conduct are available in USG Board Policy 8.2.18.1.2 and can be found on-line at https://www.usg.edu/policymanual/section8/C224/#p8.2.18_personnel_conduct.

Additionally, USG supports Freedom of Expression as stated in Board Policy 6.5 Freedom of Expression and Academic Freedom found on-line at https://www.usg.edu/policymanual/section6/C2653.

Equal Employment Opportunity

Kennesaw State University is an Equal Employment Opportunity Employer. The University is committed to maintaining a fair and respectful environment for living, work and study. To that end, and in accordance with federal and state law, Board of Regents policy, and University policy, the University prohibits harassment of or discrimination against any person because of race, color, sex (including sexual harassment, pregnancy, and medical conditions related to pregnancy), sexual orientation, gender identity, gender expression, ethnicity or national origin, religion, age, genetic information, disability, or veteran or military status by any member of the KSU Community on campus, in connection with a University program or activity, or in a manner that creates a hostile environment for members of the KSU community.

For additional information on this policy, or to file a complaint under the provisions of this policy, students, employees, applicants for employment or admission or other third parties should contact the Office of Institutional Equity at English Building, Suite 225, eeo@kennesaw.edu.

Other Information

This is not a supervisory position.

This position does not have any financial responsibilities.

This position will not be required to drive.

This role is considered a position of trust.

This position does not require a purchasing card (P-Card).

This position may travel 1% - 24% of the time

This position does not require security clearance.

Background Check

• Credit Report
• Standard Enhanced

Per the University System of Georgia background check policy, all final candidates will be required to consent to a criminal background investigation. Final candidates may be asked to disclose criminal record history during the initial screening process and prior to a conditional offer of employment. Applicants for positions of trust with screening

results which confirm a disqualifying criminal history will be immediately disqualified from employment eligibility.

All applicants are required to include professional references as part of their application process. Some positions may require additional job-based screenings such as motor vehicle report, credit check, pre-employment drug screening and/or verification of academic credentials.

https://www.usg.edu/hr/assets/hr/hrap_manual/HRAP_Background_Investigation_Employment.pdf