Lead Data Engineer

Aqovia is an international technology firm dedicated to creating tangible value through the power of AI, data-driven, and bespoke software solutions and services. Our unique approach extends beyond traditional service and solutions delivery, we strategically invest in and nurture a diverse portfolio of promising companies operating across vital sectors including financial services, health, infrastructure management, sustainability, education, and business intelligence. This commitment to innovation across a broad spectrum allows Aqovia to stay at the cutting edge, delivering transformative solutions and creating significant impact.

Role Overview

Aqovia is seeking a highly capable Principal Data Engineer to join our consulting projects team. This is a senior, client-facing role combining hands-on technical delivery with leadership, mentoring, and stakeholder engagement responsibilities. You will act as Chapter Lead for Data Engineering, setting technical standards, guiding best practices, and supporting the growth of data engineering capability across the organisation. You will also play a key role in shaping modern, scalable data solutions that support our clients’ sustainability and transformation goals. This role requires a strong blend of technical expertise, consultancy experience, leadership capability, and a proactive mindset.

Key Responsibilities

• Leadership & Chapter Ownership: Act as Chapter Lead for Data Engineering, providing technical leadership, mentoring, and guidance across the data engineering community. Set and uphold engineering standards, best practices, and ways of working. Take ownership and accountability for the quality, maintainability, and scalability of data engineering solutions.
• Delivery & Technical Responsibilities: Design, develop, modernise, and test data engineering pipelines, including ETL/ELT processes, reports, and data visualisations. Build and maintain robust real-time and batch data pipelines to meet evolving client and business needs. Load and transform customer data into target platforms using scalable and reusable patterns. Implement data management and integration solutions using APIs. Write complex, performant T-SQL queries and high-quality Python code. Ensure solutions are well-documented, reusable, maintainable, and production-ready. Apply source control best practices using Git and contribute to CI/CD pipelines.
• Stakeholder & Client Engagement: Elicit, analyse, and refine multi-stakeholder requirements, translating business needs into technical solutions. Act as a client-facing consultant, confidently engaging with technical and non-technical stakeholders. Collaborate closely with internal teams and client stakeholders to provide technical leadership and delivery assurance. Support pre-sales and sales activities where required, including solution shaping and technical input.

Key Technical Skills Required

• Strong experience designing, building, testing, and deploying data pipelines on the Azure platform.
• Advanced T-SQL and Python development skills.
• Proven experience with Git and working within source-controlled, CI/CD-driven environments.
• Expertise in Data analytics platforms (such as Hadoop, Data Bricks or Azure Synapse), Columnar data formats (e.g., Parquet, ORC, Arrow, etc), on-prem to cloud migrations, and both SQL and NoSQL data stores.
• Strong knowledge of batch and real-time data pipeline architectures, including event streaming.
• Experience in data deduplication, transformation, and conformance from source to target structures.
• Solid understanding of logical and physical data modelling and storage design.
• Ability to address observability, data governance, privacy, and architectural concerns.
• Comfortable working autonomously while adopting new tools and technologies quickly.

Soft Skills & Core Competencies

• Excellent communication skills (written and verbal), with the ability to engage confidently at all levels.
• Strong teamwork and collaboration mindset.
• Clear accountability and ownership for outcomes and delivery.
• Demonstrated leadership and mentoring capability.
• Effective time management and organisational skills.
• High adaptability and flexibility in fast-changing environments.
• Strong problem-solving and critical-thinking ability.
• Proactive, self-starting approach with clear initiative.

Nice to Have

• Experience preparing and curating data for data science workflows, including dataset construction, and ensuring data quality and lineage for model training and evaluation.
• Familiarity with Retrieval-Augmented Generation (RAG) architectures and their application in enterprise or client-facing data solutions.
• Knowledge of Infrastructure as code (IaC).
• Experience or exposure to Machine Learning concepts, pipelines, or production use cases.
• Broader software engineering or cloud-native development experience.

Joining Aqovia means:

• Making a real difference: You'll be part of a team developing solutions that empower businesses while contributing to sustainable practices.
• Growth opportunities: We invest in our employees' development and offer a path for career advancement.
• Collaborative culture: We value teamwork, open communication, and a supportive environment.
• Competitive benefits package: including healthcare, paid for gym membership, pension scheme, perkbox and more.

If you're a problem-solver who thrives in a fast-paced environment and shares our commitment to positive impact, we encourage you to apply!

Equal Opportunity Employer

At Aqovia, we believe in the strength of diversity. We strive to reflect the varied markets we serve and foster an inclusive culture where everyone feels welcome, valued, and empowered to be their authentic selves. As an equal opportunity employer, we are committed to embracing all forms of diversity across our organisation.