apella - Senior Software Engineer, Data Platform
Requirements
• We’re looking for a Senior Software Engineer, Data Platform to help evolve and operate our modern cloud data platform. You’ll build and maintain a BigQuery data warehouse with batch pipelines powered by dbt + Dagster, while also expanding a real-time streaming platform consisting of Kafka topics and Flink jobs (FlinkSQL) to process data as it arrives. • This role is ideal for someone who enjoys designing reliable data systems end-to-end: modeling and transforming data, orchestrating pipelines, enabling self-serve analytics, and ensuring the platform is observable, performant, and cost-effective. • Strong proficiency in SQL (advanced querying, performance considerations, data modeling). • Hands-on experience with dbt (models, tests, sources, macros, snapshots, incremental strategies). • Experience with batch orchestration tooling Dagster/Airflow (assets/jobs, schedules/sensors, partitioning, backfills, observability). • Proficiency in Python for data engineering tasks (pipeline glue code, libraries, tooling, testing). • Deep familiarity with BigQuery or equivalent cloud native data warehouse tooling (partitioning/clustering, cost/performance optimization, best practices). • Solid experience with GCP (AWS/Azure) infrastructure (core services, IAM, security practices, deployments/automation). • Strong engineering fundamentals: version control, testing, code review, documentation, and operational ownership. • Experience with data quality tooling and patterns (e.g., anomaly detection, expectation-based testing, lineage). • Experience designing semantic layers or metrics layers for analytics. • Familiarity with event-driven architectures, schema registries, CDC patterns, and schema evolution strategies. • Experience building or maintaining streaming data pipelines with Kafka and Apache Flink, including FlinkSQL. • Experience with IaC (e.g., Terraform) and CI/CD for data platforms. • Understanding of privacy/security controls (PII handling, access controls, auditability). • WHAT TO EXPECT FROM OUR INTERVIEW PROCESS: • Chat with Our Recruiter – A quick intro to get to know you and share more about Apella & the role • Complete a Coding Exercise – Work through a collaborative coding exercise with one of our engineers • Virtual Onsite Interviews – Meet a few team members and dive into areas like collaboration, culture, and role-specific skills. Typically 3-4 interviews • Meet with one or two of our founders – Usually "reverse interview" style where you can ask questions and make sure we're the right fit for you
Responsibilities
• Build and extend batch pipelines using dbt for transformations and Dagster for orchestration, scheduling, and asset-driven lineage. • Develop and optimize BigQuery data models (dimensional, wide-table, or domain-oriented) to support analytics, experimentation, and reporting use cases. • Advance real-time streaming capabilities by implementing and maintaining Kafka/PubSub + Flink pipelines, primarily using FlinkSQL, to deliver low-latency datasets and event-derived metrics. • Design data platform standards: SDLC, naming conventions, modeling patterns, incremental strategies, schema evolution approaches, and best practices for batch + streaming including CI/CD and testing. • Improve reliability and observability by implementing monitoring, alerting, and SLAs/SLOs for pipelines and data quality. • Partner with analytics, product, and engineering teams to onboard new data sources, define contracts, and deliver trusted datasets. • Own platform operations including performance tuning, data quality, cost optimization, and scaling across both warehouse and streaming systems. • Design a unified serving layer architecture that cleanly exposes consistent, trusted datasets across both batch and streaming systems. • Establishing strong data governance, reliability standards, and observability practices.
Benefits
• $175K – $225K • Offers Equity • Actual compensation depends on experience and qualifications. We believe in fair compensation and strive to provide a competitive package, including benefits and growth opportunities. • We assess final compensation throughout the interview process, taking into account your experience, skills, and alignment with the role’s requirements. • Upload your resume here to autofill key application fields. • Drop your resume here! • Parsing your resume. Autofilling key fields... • or drag and drop here • Decline to self-identify • Hispanic or Latino - A person of Cuban, Mexican, Puerto Rican, South or Central American, or other Spanish culture or origin regardless of race. • Hispanic or Latino • White (Not Hispanic or Latino) - A person having origins in any of the original peoples of Europe, the Middle East, or North Africa. • White • Black or African American (Not Hispanic or Latino) - A person having origins in any of the black racial groups of Africa. • Black or African American • Native Hawaiian or Other Pacific Islander (Not Hispanic or Latino) - A person having origins in any of the peoples of Hawaii, Guam, Samoa, or other Pacific Islands. • Native Hawaiian or Other Pacific Islander • Asian (Not Hispanic or Latino) - A person having origins in any of the original peoples of the Far East, Southeast Asia, or the Indian Subcontinent, including, for example, Cambodia, China, India, Japan, Korea, Malaysia, Pakistan, the Philippine Islands, Thailand, and Vietnam. • Asian • American Indian or Alaska Native (Not Hispanic or Latino) - A person having origins in any of the original peoples of North and South America (including Central America), and who maintain tribal affiliation or community attachment. • American Indian or Alaska Native • Two or More Races (Not Hispanic or Latino) - All persons who identify with more than one of the above five races. • Two or More Races • Hispanic or Latino • White (Not Hispanic or Latino) • Black or African American (Not Hispanic or Latino) • Native Hawaiian or Other Pacific Islander (Not Hispanic or Latino) • Asian (Not Hispanic or Latino) • American Indian or Alaska Native (Not Hispanic or Latino) • Two or More Races (Not Hispanic or Latino) • I identify as one or more of the classifications of protected veteran listed above • I am not a protected veteran
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