BI Architect

Senior BI & Data Warehouse Architect

Level: Senior / Principal · 15-25+ years' experience Discipline: Business Intelligence, Data Warehousing & Data Architecture Profile fit: Permanent, interim, or independent consultant

About the Role

We're looking for a senior, hands-on BI & Data Warehouse Architect who can own analytics solutions end-to-end from architecture and data modeling through build, migration, and governance. This is a "player-coach" profile: someone equally comfortable designing a target-state data platform, building the semantic model themselves, and mentoring the developers around them, while acting as translator between business stakeholders and technical delivery.

Key Responsibilities

* Design and own BI/DW architecture from the ground up, spanning on-prem and cloud environments
* Lead dimensional and semantic data modeling (Kimball methodology, star schema, Medallion architecture); maintain data dictionaries and metadata
* Plan and deliver platform migrations - legacy on-prem to cloud, or one BI/reporting toolset to another
* Build and optimize BI solutions, primarily in Power BI (DAX/MDX), alongside SSRS/SSAS or equivalent
* Design and manage ETL/ELT pipelines
* Own data governance, security/permissions, and Master Data Management (MDM) initiatives
* Translate between business requirements and technical delivery
* Lead and mentor junior BI/data team members
* Contribute to BI strategy across one or more concurrent projects or client engagements

Experience

* 15+ years in BI/Data Warehousing/Analytics; strong candidates for this profile often have 20-25 years
* Demonstrated architect-level ownership - has designed and built solutions from scratch, not only maintained existing ones
* A track record spanning legacy on-prem BI (Cognos, Business Objects, SSAS/SSRS/SSIS) through to modern cloud platforms (Azure, Snowflake, Databricks, Fabric) is a strong differentiator
* Has led at least one significant migration (e.g. on-prem → cloud, SAS → Snowflake, QlikView → Power BI, Hadoop → Microsoft stack)
* Consulting, freelance, or multi-client delivery background is a plus
* Experience leading or mentoring a small BI/data team
* Broad industry exposure rather than a single vertical (e.g. retail, banking/finance, insurance, logistics, telecom, real estate)

Technical Skills

* On-prem / legacy BI: SSIS, SSRS, SSAS, MDX, Cognos, Business Objects, SQL Server
* Cloud platforms: Azure (Azure SQL Database, Data Factory, Synapse, Analysis Services), Snowflake, Databricks, Microsoft Fabric
* BI & visualization: Power BI, DAX
* Data modeling: Kimball dimensional modeling, star schema design, Medallion (bronze/silver/gold) architecture
* Metadata & modeling tools: Erwin, Informatica Analyst (or equivalents)
* Governance & ops: Master Data Management, data security/permissions, data dictionaries
* SQL: Advanced

Education & Certifications (preferred, not required)

* Bachelor's degree in Informatics, Computer Science, Information Systems, or related field
* Vendor certifications/badges such as Microsoft Azure Fundamentals, Power Platform Fundamentals, Databricks or Snowflake credentials
* Formal DW training such as Kimball University

Nice to Have

* Experience running an independent BI consultancy or freelance practice
* Proactive, self-directed upskilling on emerging platforms (e.g. lab/sandbox experience with Fabric or Snowflake ahead of production use)
* Technical project management experience