To be considered, please submit a resume and cover letter expressing what makes you interested in the position and how your skills and capabilities align with the job requirements along with your online application.
Unit Description:
Institutional Research & Decision Support (IR&DS) is the first-choice provider of timely, high-quality, accessible information and analysis for informed decision-making at Stanford. IR&DS analyzes and reports on data from all of Stanford’s major administrative systems, including student, faculty, course, research, and financial data. IR&DS performs and facilitates complex analyses for university leadership, departments, and central offices, including collaborating with other universities to provide comparative data and proactively publishing dashboards and management reports.
Under IR&DS, the Decision Support Services (DSS) team specializes in the creation of data collections from the major administrative systems at Stanford to aid data consumers in answering complex questions.
Position Summary:
As part of the Decision Support Services (DSS) team, the Data Engineer is a key member of the Decision Support Services (DSS) team working closely with analysts and other stakeholders to deliver high-quality data solutions. Reporting to the Associate Director of Decision Support Services with minimal supervision, this role will be tasked with designing, building, profiling, testing, implementing, and managing database environments and data collections for institutional reporting, assessment, administrative decision-making, and in support of the analytical needs of other colleagues at Stanford University. This role is expected to utilize a variety of data extraction and preparation techniques, as well as technologies, in creation of robust data pipelines, infrastructure, and data repositories that punctually integrate data from multiple data sources of varying formats, which include administrative systems covering student, faculty, and employment data. The ideal candidate will possess a combination of technical expertise, an analytical mindset, and a collaborative spirit.
CORE DUTIES:
- Provide complex analysis, conceptualize, design, implement and develop solutions for critical data pipelines, databases, business intelligence applications, and other data-centric projects.
- Perform dataflow, system, and data analysis and develop meaningful and useful presentation of data in downstream applications.
- Plan and implement standards, define/code conformed global and reusable data objects, perform complex database design, data modeling, data mining, and data validation.
- Consult with client groups to assess user needs and understand the business processes; convert user requirements into technical solutions.
- Contribute to data analysis, design, and development of new and ongoing business intelligence (BI) projects involving enterprise data warehousing, data lakes, and custom data repositories.
- Collaborate closely with internal and external teams to understand and apply changes/modifications impacting data repositories.
- Conduct and participate in code walkthroughs and document technical design, lineage, data models, access control, and definitions. Assist in quality control testing and ensure data quality, accuracy, and consistency.
- Monitor ETL processes, system audits, dashboard reporting and presentation layer functioning and performance. Proactively resolve issues as found. Support the performance of systems.
- Follow the release cycles and implement on-time delivery of bug fixes, change requests, and enhancements. Troubleshoot and solve technical problems.
- Identify and assess potential data acquisitions.
- Execute solutions in a resource, time, and cost-efficient manner.
- Keep abreast of the latest developments in data engineering and business intelligence; explore and assess the use of new technologies for the office, such as cloud computing.
- Contribute to the overall process improvement and efficiency of the end-to-end data lifecycle starting from source systems to analytical end-products.
- Perform data analysis and reporting as needed for specific business intelligence or institutional research projects.
MINIMUM REQUIREMENTS:
Education & Experience:
Bachelor’s degree and seven years of relevant experience in computer science, or engineering or a combination of education and relevant experience.
Knowledge, Skills and Abilities:
- Strong proficiency in advanced SQL and experience working with relational databases, especially Oracle.
- Strong programming skills in Python for data management activities, like ETL, and analytics.
- Working knowledge of scripting languages, like shell, JavaScript, etc. for a variety of data-related tasks like orchestration, data cleansing, transformations, ingestion, and data visualization.
- Substantial experience designing and developing complex ETL pipelines extracting data from RDBMS and flat file sources like CSV, Excel, JSON, XML, etc.
- Mastery in business intelligence and data warehousing concepts and methodologies.
- Expertise in relational and dimensional data modeling and designing structured data repositories, like a data warehouse, from heterogeneous data sources, like various OLTP systems.
- Ability to design physical and reporting data models for seamless cross-functional and cross-systems data reporting.
- High expertise on data acquisition, retrieval, ETL strategies, and related tools and platforms like Informatica PowerCenter, IBM DataStage, and others.
- Expertise writing custom ETL programming for complex data processing, transformations, and enrichments using any programming language needed, like those mentioned above.
- Mastery in data reporting, analytics, and data visualization tools like OBIEE, Tableau, and PowerBI.
- Experience working with sensitive data and implementation of appropriate identity access management, governance, security, and privacy safeguards.
- Extensive experience in data analysis and root cause analysis with proven problem-solving and analytical-thinking capabilities.
- Understanding of software engineering principles, such as the software development lifecycle, and skills working on Unix/Linux/Windows operating systems, version control and Office software.
- Broad understanding of multiple existing and next generation data engineering and business intelligence tools and technologies.
- Ability to prioritize workload, manage multiple projects simultaneously, and work with minimal supervision while also working as part of a team.
- Good communication, both verbal and written, and collaboration skills along with experience working directly with analysts and data scientists.
- Ability to train analysts and developers on definitive tasks related to developed data sets and processes.
- Ability and desire to learn and adapt to new technologies.
Preferred Qualifications:
- Experience in higher education in a similar role.
- Experience managing and utilizing cloud computing platforms and services for data solutions, such as AWS, Google Cloud, and/or Azure.
- Experience working with NoSQL databases and object storage for handling unstructured and semi-structured data.
- Experience programming in R, Scala, Java, and other languages used in data engineering and data science.
Certifications and Licenses:
None
PHYSICAL REQUIREMENTS*:
- Constantly perform desk-based computer tasks.
- Frequently sitting.
- Occasionally stand/walk.
- Rarely writing by hand; lift/carry/push/pull objects that weigh up to 10 pounds.
* - Consistent with its obligations under the law, the University will provide reasonable accommodation to any employee with a disability who requires accommodation to perform the essential functions of the job.
WORKING CONDITIONS:
There may be occasions when it is necessary to accomplish work beyond the regularly scheduled workday.
WORK STANDARDS:
- Interpersonal Skills: Demonstrates the ability to work well with Stanford colleagues and clients and with external organizations.
- Promote Culture of Safety: Demonstrates commitment to personal responsibility and value for safety; communicates safety concerns; uses and promotes safe behaviors based on training and lessons learned.
- Subject to and expected to comply with all applicable University policies and procedures, including but not limited to the personnel policies and other policies found in the University’s Administrative Guide.
Why Stanford is for You
Imagine a world without search engines or social platforms. Consider lives saved through first-ever organ transplants and research to cure illnesses. Stanford University has revolutionized the way we live and enrich the world. Supporting this mission is our diverse and dedicated 17,000 staff. We seek talent driven to impact the future of our legacy. Our culture and unique perks empower you with:
- Freedom to grow. We offer career development programs, tuition reimbursement, or audit a course. Join a TedTalk, film screening, or listen to a renowned author or global leader speak.
- A caring culture. We provide superb retirement plans, generous time-off, and family care resources.
- A healthier you. Climb our rock wall, or choose from hundreds of health or fitness classes at our world-class exercise facilities. We also provide excellent health care benefits.
- Discovery and fun. Stroll through historic gardens, or enjoy the beauty of our campus.
