Sr. Data Engineer

As a Sr. Data Engineer at Oportun, you will be a key member of our team, responsible for designing, developing, and maintaining sophisticated software/data platforms to achieve the charter of the engineering group. Your mastery of a technical domain enables you to take up business problems and solve them with a technical solution. With your depth of expertise and leadership abilities, you will actively contribute to architectural decisions, mentor junior engineers, and collaborate closely with cross-functional teams to deliver high-quality, scalable software solutions that advance our impact in the market.

This is a role where you will have the opportunity to take up responsibility in leading the technology effort—from technical requirements gathering to final successful delivery of the product—for large initiatives (cross-functional and multi-month-long projects).

At Oportun, we move fast and we hold each other to a high bar. If you care about doing your best work while actually moving the needle for real people, you’ll fit right in.

Your Day-to-Day

• You’ll design and implement scalable, efficient, and reliable data architectures that support business and analytical needs.
• You’ll build and maintain data pipelines, ETL processes, and integration solutions for large volumes of structured and unstructured data.
• You’ll optimize data pipelines, databases, data warehouses, and data lakes for performance, reliability, scalability, and security.
• You’ll partner with stakeholders to understand data requirements, develop domain expertise, and translate business needs into effective data models and solutions.
• You’ll establish and improve data quality standards, validation rules, documentation, and governance practices.
• You’ll implement monitoring and observability practices to identify bottlenecks, improve performance, and strengthen platform reliability.
• You’ll provide technical leadership on architecture, scalability, reliability, monitoring, integration, and extensibility.
• You’ll lead and contribute to code reviews, helping maintain high standards for code quality, performance, and maintainability.
• You’ll mentor junior engineers and support a culture of continuous learning and technical excellence.
• You’ll take ownership of production issues, including troubleshooting, root-cause analysis, escalation, and long-term resolution.
• You’ll independently lead multiple features and projects, coordinate work across engineers, and keep stakeholders informed of progress, risks, and dependencies.
• You’ll help evolve engineering tools, platforms, and practices and encourage adoption of better ways of working.
• You’ll look for practical ways to use AI tools to improve engineering productivity, analysis, documentation, and problem-solving.

Who You Are

The right fit looks like this:

You’re a hands-on data engineer who enjoys solving complex technical problems and building systems that others depend on. You combine strong technical depth with a practical understanding of business needs and know how to turn ambiguous requirements into scalable solutions.

You take ownership, communicate clearly, and are comfortable leading technical work without relying on formal authority. You enjoy mentoring others and helping teams make stronger technical decisions.

What You Bring

Skills & Experience

Required:

• 8+ years of experience in data engineering, with strong experience in data architecture, ETL, and database management.
• Strong programming skills in Python or PySpark, plus experience with Java or Scala.
• Experience building complex end-to-end data pipelines and data integration solutions.
• Strong knowledge of SQL and experience with relational and NoSQL database technologies.
• Experience with big data technologies such as Spark, Kafka, Hadoop, or similar platforms.
• Experience with orchestration and scheduling tools such as Airflow, Databricks, Jenkins, or similar technologies.
• Experience designing and operating scalable, reliable, and secure data systems.
• Familiarity with cloud platforms such as AWS, Azure, or GCP and associated data services.
• Experience working in Agile environments such as Scrum, Lean, or Kanban.
• Strong problem-solving and decision-making skills.
• Experience mentoring junior engineers and contributing to technical leadership within a team.
• Strong written and verbal communication skills with the ability to work effectively across technical and non-technical teams.

Nice to Have

• Bachelor’s or Master’s degree in Computer Science, Data Science, or a related field.
• Databricks experience or certification.
• Experience with AWS Redshift, S3, Azure SQL Data Warehouse, or comparable cloud data services.
• Experience implementing data governance, data quality, or observability frameworks.
• Experience leading cross-functional or multi-month engineering initiatives.
• Experience using AI-assisted engineering tools to improve development, troubleshooting, documentation, or productivity.

Our AI Mindset

We build with AI. We lead with judgment.

AI isn’t a feature here. It’s how we work.

We’re excited about what AI makes possible, and we’re looking for people who share that curiosity. You don’t need to be an expert. You need to be open to experimenting, willing to learn, and able to apply new tools in ways that actually move the needle.

In this role, you’ll be encouraged to explore AI tools, find practical use cases for your function, and bring ideas for working smarter. We believe the best outcomes come when human judgment and AI capability work together.