Data architect

Job Description

Purpose of the role

To design, develop, and implement solutions to complex business problems, collaborating with stakeholders to understand their needs and requirements, and design and implement solutions that meet those needs and create solutions that balance technology risks against business delivery, driving consistency.

Accountabilities

• Design and development of solutions as products that can evolve, meeting business requirements that align with modern software engineering practices and automated delivery tooling. This includes identification and implementation of the technologies and platforms.
• Targeted design activities that apply an appropriate workload placement strategy and maximise the benefit of cloud capabilities such as elasticity, serverless, containerisation etc.
• Best practice designs incorporating security principles (such as defence in depth and reduction of blast radius) that meet the Bank’s resiliency expectations.
• Solutions that appropriately balance risks and controls to deliver the agreed business and technology value.
• Adoption of standardised solutions where they fit. If no standard solutions fit, feed into their ongoing evolution where appropriate.
• Fault finding and performance issues support to operational support teams, leveraging available tooling.
• Solution design impact assessment in terms of risk, capacity and cost impact, inc. estimation of project change and ongoing run costs.
• Development of the requisite architecture inputs required to comply with the banks governance processes, including design artefacts required for architecture, privacy, security and records management governance processes.

Assistant Vice President Expectations

• To advise and influence decision making, contribute to policy development and take responsibility for operational effectiveness. Collaborate closely with other functions/ business divisions.
• Lead a team performing complex tasks, using well developed professional knowledge and skills to deliver on work that impacts the whole business function. Set objectives and coach employees in pursuit of those objectives, appraisal of performance relative to objectives and determination of reward outcomes
• If the position has leadership responsibilities, People Leaders are expected to demonstrate a clear set of leadership behaviours to create an environment for colleagues to thrive and deliver to a consistently excellent standard. The four LEAD behaviours are: L – Listen and be authentic, E – Energise and inspire, A – Align across the enterprise, D – Develop others.
• OR for an individual contributor, they will lead collaborative assignments and guide team members through structured assignments, identify the need for the inclusion of other areas of specialisation to complete assignments. They will identify new directions for assignments and/ or projects, identifying a combination of cross functional methodologies or practices to meet required outcomes.
• Consult on complex issues; providing advice to People Leaders to support the resolution of escalated issues.
• Identify ways to mitigate risk and developing new policies/procedures in support of the control and governance agenda.
• Take ownership for managing risk and strengthening controls in relation to the work done.
• Perform work that is closely related to that of other areas, which requires understanding of how areas coordinate and contribute to the achievement of the objectives of the organisation sub-function.
• Collaborate with other areas of work, for business aligned support areas to keep up to speed with business activity and the business strategy.
• Engage in complex analysis of data from multiple sources of information, internal and external sources such as procedures and practises (in other areas, teams, companies, etc).to solve problems creatively and effectively.
• Communicate complex information. 'Complex' information could include sensitive information or information that is difficult to communicate because of its content or its audience.
• Influence or convince stakeholders to achieve outcomes.

All colleagues will be expected to demonstrate the Barclays Values of Respect, Integrity, Service, Excellence and Stewardship – our moral compass, helping us do what we believe is right. They will also be expected to demonstrate the Barclays Mindset – to Empower, Challenge and Drive – the operating manual for how we behave.

Join us as a Data Architect Barclays, responsible for supporting the successful delivery of Location Strategy projects to plan, budget, agreed quality and governance standards. You'll spearhead the evolution of our digital landscape, driving innovation and excellence. You will harness cutting-edge technology to revolutionise our digital offerings, ensuring unparalleled customer experiences.

Basic/ Essential Qualifications:

• Strong experience in AWS data engineering (S3, Glue, EMR, Athena, IAM).
• Advanced Python development skills for data engineering.
• Strong hands‑on experience with Apache Spark / PySpark .
• Proven experience with Databricks (development, optimisation, notebooks, jobs).
• Hands‑on experience with Apache Airflow and Astronomer .
• Strong SQL skills and experience working with large datasets.
• Experience with CI/CD , Git‑based version control, and DevOps practices for data platforms.

Data & Platform Knowledge

• Solid understanding of data modelling , lakehouse architecture, and analytics‑ready data design.
• Experience implementing data quality, validation, and reconciliation frameworks .
• Familiarity with metadata, lineage, and data governance concepts .

Banking / Enterprise Experience (Preferred)

• Experience working in financial services or regulated environments .
• Understanding of risk, controls, and non‑functional requirements (resilience, security, audit).

Leadership & Behaviours (AVP Expectations)

• Demonstrates ownership and accountability for technical deliverables.
• Strong problem‑solving and analytical mindset .
• Effective communicator across technical and non‑technical stakeholders.
• Mentors junior engineers and promotes engineering best practices.
• Champions engineering excellence, automation, and continuous improvement .
• Bachelor’s or Master’s degree in Computer Science, Engineering, or a related field.
• Cloud or data engineering certifications (AWS / Databricks) are desirable.

Desirable skillsets/ good to have:

• Data Design & Architecture
• Own logical and physical data design for curated, conformed, and consumption‑ready datasets.
• Translate business and analytical requirements into scalable data models (dimensional, domain‑oriented, lakehouse patterns).
• Contribute to data architecture decisions aligned with Barclays cloud, security, and governance standards.
• Data Engineering & Development
• Design and develop end‑to‑end data pipelines using:
• AWS (S3, Glue, EMR, Athena, Lambda, IAM, CloudWatch)
• Apache Spark (PySpark) for large‑scale batch and streaming processing
• Databricks for lakehouse‑based transformations and analytics enablement
• Build robust ingestion, transformation, and curation pipelines handling structured and semi‑structured data.
• Ensure pipelines are performance‑optimised, cost‑efficient, and resilient.
• Orchestration & Automation
• Develop and manage workflows using Apache Airflow.
• Implement and operate Airflow pipelines on Astronomer, following enterprise scheduling, monitoring, and alerting standards.
• Embed CI/CD pipelines, automated testing, and deployment controls for data workloads.
• Data Quality, Governance & Controls
• Implement data quality checks, reconciliation controls, and lineage.
• Ensure compliance with Barclays data governance, security, privacy, and regulatory requirements.
• Support audit, risk, and control processes through well‑documented and traceable data solutions.
• Stakeholder & Delivery Responsibilities

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