Principal Architect- Snowflake

About the Role

As the Principal Snowflake Architect, you will define and implement the enterprise Snowflake platform strategy, security architecture, and governance frameworks while leading the setup and operational excellence of Snowflake environments.

Responsibilities

• Define the enterprise Snowflake architecture roadmap and target-state platform strategy.
• Design Snowflake account structures, environment separation, and workload isolation strategies.
• Develop standards for databases, schemas, warehouses, integrations, stages, streams, tasks, shares, and security objects.
• Establish platform design principles focused on scalability, resiliency, governance, and operational excellence.
• Lead architecture reviews and approve platform patterns, standards, and implementation approaches.
• Collaborate with enterprise architecture, security, infrastructure, and governance teams.
• Lead Snowflake platform setup across Development, Testing, UAT, Disaster Recovery, and Production environments.
• Design and implement account provisioning standards and enterprise naming conventions for databases, schemas, warehouses, roles, service accounts, and security objects.
• Create and manage Snowflake warehouses, databases, schemas, users, grants, roles, and resource monitoring frameworks.
• Define logical workload segmentation and compute allocation strategies.
• Implement platform governance, capacity management, and operational controls from inception.
• Design enterprise-grade RBAC models aligned with organizational structures and regulatory requirements.
• Implement role hierarchy frameworks based on least-privilege principles.
• Configure enterprise authentication mechanisms including SSO, SCIM, MFA, and federated identity integration.
• Implement Dynamic Data Masking, Row Access Policies, Tag-Based Access Controls, and Object Ownership frameworks.
• Define secure data-sharing architectures for internal and external consumers.
• Ensure compliance with data privacy and regulatory requirements.

Requirements

• 10+ years of experience in Data Architecture, Data Engineering, or Enterprise Data Platforms.
• 5+ years of hands-on Snowflake architecture and administration experience.
• Experience implementing enterprise-scale Snowflake platforms supporting multiple business domains.
• Experience designing secure and governed cloud-based data platforms.

Preferred Qualifications

• SnowPro Advanced Architect, SnowPro Core, or Snowflake Specialty Certifications.
• Experience implementing enterprise-scale dbt Cloud environments, including CI/CD, reusable frameworks, testing strategies, documentation, and lineage management.
• Experience with Fivetran or other cloud-native ELT ingestion platforms.
• Experience with Airflow/Astronomer for orchestration and workflow management.
• Experience with Apache Iceberg, modern data lake architectures, and open table formats.

Pay

The annual salary for this position is between $160,000 and $180,000, depending on experience and qualifications. This position is also eligible for Cognizant’s discretionary annual incentive program, based on performance.

Benefits

• Medical, Dental, Vision, and Life Insurance
• Paid holidays plus Paid Time Off
• 401(k) plan and contributions
• Long-term and Short-term Disability
• Paid Parental Leave
• Employee Stock Purchase Plan