Senior Staff Data Engineer

Our Enterprise Data & Analytics (EDA) team is looking for an experienced Senior Staff Engineer to lead the architecture and engineering of an Enterprise AI-ready semantic data platform. We are building an AI-ready Enterprise data foundation that enables analytics applications and AI agents to operate from the same trusted understanding of business data.

Our platform includes trusted foundational data models across Customer Finance GTM and Product; a governed semantic layer for metrics dimensions entities relationships and business context; and conversational analytics over enterprise data.

As a Senior Staff Engineer on our EDA Engineering Team this role sits at the intersection of data engineering data architecture software engineering and AI. The successful candidate will partner with architects data engineers data scientists Analysts Teams and AI teams to establish reusable platform capabilities that are reliable observable secure governed and practical to adopt. This role is ideal for someone who can set technical direction across multiple teams while remaining hands-on with architecture prototyping and production delivery.

• Define the enterprise semantic architecture for metrics dimensions entities relationships grain time semantics and business context over trusted foundational data models.

• Establish reusable semantic contracts so analytics applications and AI systems operate from consistent business definitions and governed data products.

• Evaluate and recommend the long-term semantic platform architecture including Snowflake Semantic Views dbt Semantic Layer / MetricFlow Cube and other approaches.

• Design and build metadata-driven platform capabilities for semantic discovery deterministic metric computation query generation governed access versioning and extensibility.

• Define how conversational analytics systems consume enterprise semantics and structured data partnering with AI teams on building Data Agents and other AI interfaces.

• Establish golden datasets and evaluation practices for semantic interpretation generated-query accuracy metric correctness and analytical answer quality.

• Lead complex multi-team initiatives from architecture and proof of concept through production adoption operational support and continuous improvement.

• Influence build-versus-buy decisions mentor engineers and raise the technical bar across Data Engineering Analytics BI and AI.

• Treat the platform as an internal product by improving contributor experience documentation onboarding adoption and migration from duplicate implementations.

Basic Qualifications

• Bachelors or Masters degree in Computer Science Data Engineering Data Science or a related field or equivalent practical experience.

• 10 years of experience in data engineering data architecture distributed systems software engineering or related platform disciplines with significant technical leadership experience.

• At least 3 years of hands on experience in Semantic Layer implementation

• Demonstrated experience designing and building large-scale data analytics semantic developer or platform systems used by multiple teams. (ex. Atscale DBT Metric Flow etc.) in production environments

• Deep expertise with modern analytical warehouses and transformation frameworks including Snowflake or Databricks dbt and cloud-based ELT pipelines.

• Strong software engineering fundamentals and production experience with SQL and at least one programming language such as Python Java Go Scala or similar.

• Deep understanding of dimensional entity-based and analytical data modeling including grain relationships time dimensions and metric definitions.

• Excellent communication skills and the ability to collaborate with executives architects engineers analysts data scientists and business stakeholders.

• Proven ability to mentor senior engineers and influence technical decisions across multiple teams.

• Experience with one or more of Snowflake Semantic Views dbt Semantic Layer / MetricFlow Cube LookML / Looker or comparable semantic and metrics platforms.

• Experience with text-to-SQL agent evaluation MCP or conversational analytics.

• Experience defining deterministic boundaries between governed metric computation and probabilistic AI reasoning.

• Experience evaluating vendors or open-source platforms and translating architectural recommendations into an adoption roadmap.

• ELT (MYSQL CDC Kafka Snowflake Fivetran dbt Core & DBT Cloud Astronomer Alation Montecarlo)

• BI (Tableau Looker)

• Infrastructure (AWS Kubernetes Terraform Github Actions)

The US annualized base salary range for this position is $200000.00-$300000.00. This position may also be eligible for bonus benefits or related incentives. While this range reflects the minimum and maximum value for new hire salaries for the position across all US locations the offer for the successful candidate for this position will be based on job related capabilities applicable experience and other factors such as work location. Please note that the compensation details listed in US role postings reflect the base salary only (or OTE for commissions based roles) and do not include bonus benefits or related incentives.

The intelligent heart of customer experience

Zendesk software was built to bring a sense of calm to the chaotic world of customer service. Today we power billions of conversations with brands you know and love.

Zendesk believes in offering our people a fulfilling and inclusive experience. Our hybrid way of working enables us to purposefully come together in person at one of our many Zendesk offices around the world to connect collaborate and learn whilst also giving our people the flexibility to work remotely for part of the week.

As part of our commitment to fairness and transparency we inform all applicants that artificial intelligence (AI) or automated decision systems may be used to screen or evaluate applications for this position in accordance with Company guidelines and applicable law.

Zendesk is an equal opportunity employer and were proud of our ongoing efforts to foster global diversity equity & inclusion in the workplace. Individuals seeking employment and employees at Zendesk are considered without regard to race color religion national origin age sex gender gender identity gender expression sexual orientation marital status medical condition ancestry disability military or veteran status or any other characteristic protected by applicable law. We are an AA/EEO/Veterans/Disabled employer. If you are based in the United States and would like more information about your EEO rights under the law please click here.

Zendesk endeavors to make reasonable accommodations for applicants with disabilities and disabled veterans pursuant to applicable federal and state law. If you are an individual with a disability and require a reasonable accommodation to submit this application complete any pre-employment testing or otherwise participate in the employee selection process please send an e-mail to with your specific accommodation request.