Principal Data Engineer

Are you ready to shape the future technological landscape in Europe?

We are dedicated to responsible digitalisation, building innovative, inclusive solutions that drive meaningful impact. With over 8,900 professionals across Europe, we help EU institutions, public and private organisations thrive in a rapidly evolving digital world. Are you ready to shape the future through technology? Your journey starts here. Take a look at some of our impactful projects here: https://netcompany.com/cases/

Ever wondered what it feels like to be a Principal Data Engineer in Netcompany ?

Joining us as a Principal Data Engineer, you will lead and grow multiple delivery teams in our Data Intelligence & AI practice, owning a portfolio of cloud data lake and lakehouse engagements across Azure, AWS and Databricks. This is a strategic technical leadership role: you will set technical direction, shape how AI coding assistants and agentic workflows reshape data engineering delivery, lead pre-sales and bids, and grow the Leads who run individual engagements — while staying technically credible enough to go deep when it matters.

As a Principal Data Engineer you will:

• Lead and grow multiple delivery teams of Cloud Data Management and Data Lake Engineers, managing Leads and Engineering Principals, setting technical direction and coaching at scale.
• Own a portfolio of client engagements end-to-end — delivery quality, commercial health, risk, and strategic alignment across the portfolio.
• Shape technical strategy and architecture standards for cloud-native data lakes and lakehouses (Delta Lake, Apache Iceberg) using medallion architecture on Azure, AWS and/or Databricks.
• Drive AI-powered transformation across the practice — defining how AI coding assistants, agentic workflows and LLM-based accelerators reshape data engineering delivery, and rolling these patterns out at scale.
• Lead pre-sales and commercial activities: solution design, technical estimations, bid leadership, and client conversations at Director / VP level.
• Partner with the Head of Data Management and BI Engineering on practice growth — hiring, capability building, the capability roadmap, and positioning the practice in the market.
• Build cross-practice partnerships with AI/ML, BI and application leadership so that what your teams deliver serves analytics, AI and operational use cases end-to-end.
• Champion engineering excellence and DataOps maturity — CI/CD for data, IaC, security, observability and governance — across all teams under your remit.

What would make you a fit for the role:

• 9+ years of experience in data engineering / cloud data management, including 3+ years managing Principals or leads in a consulting or services context.
• Proven track record building and growing data engineering teams or sub-practices, owning a portfolio of concurrent engagements.
• Deep hands-on architecture experience across at least one major cloud data platform — Azure, AWS or Databricks — including data lake / lakehouse design and medallion architecture.
• Strong commercial acumen — leading pre-sales, technical estimations, bid responses and shaping deals with senior client stakeholders.
• Strong technical credibility with SQL, Python, Spark, orchestration tools (Apache Airflow, Prefect, Dagster or Databricks Workflows) and open table formats — you can still go deep in design reviews and architecture decisions when needed.
• Experience setting standards for performance, cost, security and data quality at scale, across multiple engagements.
• Excellent communication and client relationship skills at senior stakeholder level (Director / VP and above), with a coaching mindset for the Leads you grow.
• Bachelor’s or Master’s degree in Computer Science, Data Engineering, Data Science or a related field.

It would also be a plus if you match some of the following:

• Track record of defining and executing AI-powered transformation strategies inside an engineering organisation — not just adopting tools, but reshaping ways of working.
• Hands-on familiarity with AI coding assistants and agentic AI tools (e.g. Claude Code, Copilot-class tools, LLM-based agents) and experience rolling them out across teams.
• Experience with GenAI / ML enablement patterns on top of data lakes and lakehouses — feature stores, vector stores (e.g. pgvector, Pinecone, Weaviate, Databricks Vector Search) and RAG architectures.
• Ownership of data governance and responsible-AI programs using platforms such as Unity Catalog, Microsoft Purview, Collibra or Atlan.
• Experience with dbt for in-warehouse / in-lakehouse transformations, and exposure to Microsoft Fabric or other emerging unified data platforms.
• Experience with BI tooling (Power BI, Tableau, Qlik) and shaping integrated analytics strategy on top of data platforms.
• Streaming technologies (Kafka, Spark Structured Streaming, Auto Loader, CDC patterns), Kubernetes, microservices, IBM Cloud Pak for Data.
• DevOps / DataOps tooling and Infrastructure-as-Code (Terraform, Bicep).
• Relevant certifications (e.g. Azure Data Engineer Associate, AWS Data Analytics / Data Engineer, Databricks Certified Data Engineer / Professional).

Being a part of the Netcompany team, you will be provided with: 

• The opportunity to work in a modern environment & in a hybrid working model
• A seamless onboarding experience and a buddy to support you on your first steps
• A competitive compensation & benefits package
• Health and life insurance program 
• Meal and commuting allowance
• Well-being activities (on premises)
• Continuous learning opportunities using the most modern methods (unlimited access to Udemy for Business, ad-hoc trainings)
• A personalized development plan for targeted career growth

If you are looking forward to be part of a diverse environment, and have the opportunity to work alongside well-experienced professionals, on challenging, large-scale projects that directly impact millions of citizens around the globe, then this is the place to be!

By joining Netcompany in Athens, you will be part of a vivid team of 2,300+ tech professionals. When at the office, you'll have the flexibility to work from our three modern, sustainable, and state-of-the-art offices!

Please upload your CV in English via the Apply button. All applications will be treated as strictly confidential.

We ensure equal opportunities, treatment, and consideration to all candidates. Discrimination based on sex, racial or ethnic origin, religion or belief, disability, age, sexual orientation or marital status, physical or mental disability, or any other factor protected by applicable laws and regulations is prohibited. As part of the Netcompany culture, we respect human rights and focus on creating a positive workplace, where all employees are valued, and where diversity and inclusion are a vital part of our everyday working experience.

In the following link you may find our CV Submission privacy notice: https://netcompany.com/cv-submission-privacy-notice/