Principal Data Architect

About the role

Built on meritocracy, our unique company culture rewards self-starters and those who are committed to doing what is best for our customers. Brown & Brown is seeking a Principal Data Architect to join our growing team in Atlanta, GA, Dallas, TX, or Daytona Beach, FL.

Responsibilities

• Define and own the Retail data and AI architecture blueprint, covering data ingestion, storage, transformation, serving, governance, and AI/ML deployment.
• Establish the target state architecture across cloud platforms, data products, AI systems, and integration patterns - with a clear, pragmatic roadmap from current to future state.
• Lead architecture governance - chairing design reviews, evaluating technology proposals, and enforcing standards across data engineering, AI/ML, and analytics teams.
• Translate business strategy and regulatory obligations into concrete, actionable architectural decisions with well-documented tradeoffs.
• Serve as the primary technical liaison between Corporate, Retail IT leadership, and enterprise architecture functions across B&B.
• Design the Medallion architecture and enforce Lakehouse best practices including Delta Lake, Unity Catalog, data product publishing patterns aligned to Data Mesh principles.
• Define data modeling standards across entities ensuring consistency.
• Oversee the architecture of the reference MDM platform and its integration with upstream policy systems, downstream analytics, and the data Lakehouse.
• Design enterprise data integration patterns - API-first, event-driven, and ETL/ELT architectures and Integrations to source systems both Internal & external.
• Ensure platform architecture meets high availability, disaster recovery, scalability, and cost efficiency requirements for a regulated insurance environment.
• Define the Retail AI/ML architecture - spanning model development, training, deployment, monitoring, and governance - built on Databricks Mosaic AI, Azure Machine Learning, and Azure OpenAI.
• Architect the MLOps platform including CI/CD pipelines for ML models, feature store design, model registry, experiment tracking (MLflow), and production model serving.
• Design Generative AI and LLM architectures - including Retrieval-Augmented Generation (RAG) systems, agentic frameworks, prompt management, and responsible AI guardrails – for broking insurance use cases across underwriting, claims, and actuarial functions.
• Establish AI governance and model risk management frameworks ensuring all production AI systems are explainable, auditable, and compliant with regulatory expectations.
• Evaluate and recommend foundational models, AI platforms, and emerging technologies maintaining an architectural view of the evolving AI landscape and its applicability.
• Design the enterprise data governance architecture in partnership with the Data Governance function - covering data cataloging, lineage, classification, quality, and stewardship workflows.
• Define data access control and security architecture - including RBAC, ABAC, column/row-level security, data masking, and encryption standards across all platform layers.
• Ensure architecture adherence to regulatory and compliance requirements.
• Audit trails to support certification, audit readiness, and regulatory examination requirements.
• Define and maintain the enterprise data and AI engineering standards - including coding standards, design patterns, testing frameworks, CI/CD practices, and documentation requirements.
• Create and curate a reference architecture library of reusable patterns for ingestion, transformation, serving, AI deployment, and integration - reducing duplication and accelerating delivery across domain teams.
• Conduct architecture reviews and design critiques for major initiatives, providing structured guidance that balances technical rigor with delivery pragmatism.
• Mentor and coach senior data engineers, ML engineers, and domain architects - elevating the overall technical quality and architectural thinking across the team.
• Stay current with the evolving data and AI technology landscape and bring forward well-reasoned recommendations for platform evolution.
• Cross-Functional Leadership & Stakeholder Engagement Partner with business leaders to understand domain data needs and translate them into durable architectural solutions.
• Collaborate with Enterprise IT, Enterprise Architecture, Information Security, and Vendor Management to ensure data and AI architecture is aligned with enterprise technology standards and procurement strategy.
• Represent data and AI architecture in vendor evaluations, RFPs, and technology due diligence - providing structured assessments of platform capabilities, integration complexity, and total cost of ownership.
• Produce executive-ready architecture documentation, roadmaps for Retail Data & AI and senior leadership consumption.

Qualifications

• Bachelor’s degree in computer science, Information Systems, Data Engineering, or a related technical field. Master's degree is strongly preferred.
• 7+ years of progressive experience in data architecture, data engineering, or enterprise architecture roles - with at least 4 years in a senior or lead architect capacity.
• Demonstrated experience designing and delivering enterprise-scale data platforms in cloud environments, with a strong preference for Microsoft Azure, Google and Databricks.
• Significant experience in financial services, insurance, or similarly regulated industries - Broking domain experience strongly preferred.
• Experience working directly with senior business leaders as a technical advisor and architecture authority.

Skills

• Deeply technical, intellectually curious architect.
• Strong understanding of data platforms, AI/ML systems, data governance frameworks, and integration patterns.
• Ability to shape long-term strategies and roll up their sleeves to validate designs, prototype solutions, and guide engineering teams through complex delivery challenges.

Benefits

• Health Benefits: Medical/Rx, Dental, Vision, Life Insurance, Disability Insurance
• Financial Benefits: ESPP; 401k; Student Loan Assistance; Tuition Reimbursement
• Mental Health & Wellness: Free Mental Health & Enhanced Advocacy Services
• Additional benefits may vary for subsidiary entities or in specific geographic locations.