Product Owner – Data Engineering (Databricks / Snowflake)

Product Owner – Data Engineering (Databricks / Snowflake)

Location: Remote (Must reside and work within the United States)
Employment Type: Contract / Contract-to-Hire
Experience Required: 10+ Years

Job Summary

We are seeking an experienced Product Owner with a strong background in Data Engineering to drive the successful delivery of enterprise data products and platform initiatives. The ideal candidate will work closely with Product Managers, Data Engineers, Architects, and Business stakeholders to translate business needs into actionable user stories, prioritize product backlogs, and ensure high-quality product delivery.

This role requires a strong understanding of modern data platforms, cloud technologies, and Agile delivery practices. Experience with Databricks and Snowflake is highly preferred.

Candidates with experience in Financial Services or Banking are strongly preferred.

Required Qualifications

• 10+ years of overall IT industry experience.
• 5+ years of experience as a Product Owner supporting enterprise technology or data platform initiatives.
• Strong experience working with Data Engineering teams and modern data platforms.
• Solid understanding of:
• ETL/ELT Pipelines
• Data Warehousing
• Data Lakes
• Lakehouse Architecture
• Data Modeling
• Data Governance
• Data Quality concepts
• Experience working with Agile/Scrum methodologies in a Product Owner capacity.
• Strong experience creating and managing Product Backlogs.
• Experience writing detailed User Stories and Acceptance Criteria.
• Ability to prioritize work based on business value, dependencies, and technical complexity.
• Excellent communication and stakeholder management skills.
• Experience collaborating with Product Managers, Data Engineers, Architects, QA, and Business teams.
• Functional understanding of SQL and data analysis concepts.
• Experience working with cloud platforms such as AWS, Azure, or Google Cloud Platform.

Preferred Qualifications

• Hands-on experience with Databricks (highly preferred).
• Experience with Snowflake.
• Familiarity with Delta Lake, Apache Spark, and modern analytics platforms.
• Experience with data governance and metadata management tools.
• Exposure to BI and analytics platforms such as Power BI or Tableau.
• Financial Services, Banking, Wealth Management, Insurance, or Capital Markets domain experience.
• SAFe Product Owner/Product Manager (POPM) Certification or Certified Scrum Product Owner (CSPO).

Key Responsibilities

• Own and manage the Product Backlog for enterprise Data Engineering initiatives.
• Collaborate with Product Managers and business stakeholders to understand business objectives and translate them into prioritized product features.
• Develop detailed User Stories, Acceptance Criteria, and business requirements.
• Prioritize backlog items based on business value, customer impact, and technical dependencies.
• Partner with Data Engineers, Architects, QA, and Scrum teams throughout the Agile development lifecycle.
• Participate in Sprint Planning, Backlog Refinement, Daily Standups, Sprint Reviews, and Retrospectives.
• Clarify requirements and remove ambiguities for development teams during sprint execution.
• Validate completed work against acceptance criteria and business expectations.
• Coordinate User Acceptance Testing (UAT) and support production releases.
• Track product progress, identify risks, and communicate status to stakeholders.
• Ensure delivered solutions align with enterprise architecture, governance, security, and compliance standards.
• Drive continuous improvement of product delivery processes and Agile best practices.

Technical Environment

• Databricks
• Snowflake
• AWS / Azure
• Spark
• SQL
• Python (functional understanding)
• ETL / ELT Pipelines
• Lakehouse Architecture
• Data Warehousing
• Jira / Azure DevOps
• Confluence
• Agile / Scrum
• SAFe