Selby Jennings
Senior Data Engineer
Full Time · In Office · Chicago, Illinois (USA)
$200,000–$500,000 · Posted Jul 30, 2026
We are looking for an experienced Data Engineer to join a high-performing technology team in Chicago. This individual will play a key role in designing and supporting scalable data platforms that power critical business operations and analytics. The ideal candidate thrives in a fast-paced, data-intensive environment and enjoys solving complex engineering challenges at scale.
Responsibilities
- Design, implement, and maintain large-scale data infrastructure and distributed data platforms.
- Develop and support real-time and batch data processing systems using modern streaming and big data technologies.
- Build robust data pipelines and workflows to efficiently ingest, transform, and deliver data across the organization.
- Partner with software engineers, platform teams, and business stakeholders to define data models, optimize data flows, and support long-term capacity planning.
- Ensure the reliability, quality, and availability of enterprise data assets.
- Provide technical guidance and subject matter expertise on data architecture, data engineering best practices, and platform capabilities.
- Monitor and troubleshoot data systems, driving root cause analysis and continuous improvement efforts.
Qualifications
- 5+ years of experience designing and supporting data engineering solutions in large-scale production environments.
- Experience building and supporting streaming data platforms, including technologies such as Kafka or similar messaging systems.
- Hands-on experience working with modern data lake, cloud storage, or distributed data platforms such as S3, HDFS, Databricks, Iceberg, or related technologies.
- Strong experience developing data applications using frameworks such as Spark, Flink, or comparable distributed processing technologies.
- Proficiency in Java, Python, and SQL.
- Experience leveraging Python-based analytics, data science, or machine learning libraries.
- Strong understanding of containerization and orchestration technologies, including Docker and Kubernetes.
- Experience with observability, monitoring, and alerting tools in distributed environments.
- Strong analytical and problem-solving skills, with the ability to investigate and resolve complex production issues.
- Experience working in Linux/Unix environments and developing automation through scripting languages such as Python and Bash.
Preferred Background
- Experience supporting real-time, high-throughput data ecosystems.
- Familiarity with data governance, data quality, and operational excellence practices.
- Ability to collaborate effectively across engineering, platform, and business teams in a highly technical environment.
Mention you found this on Data First Jobs — it helps us bring you more roles like this.
Senior Data Engineer
Selby Jennings
Similar Engineering Jobs
View all Engineering jobs→JetBrains
Lead Forward Deployed Engineer (AI-Native Software Development )
Bright Vision Technologies
AI Performance Engineer
Autodesk
Senior Software Developer (Data & Backend Development)
BambooHR
Sr. Data Engineer
Arista Networks
Mechanical Design Engineer - Data Center Hardware
Neighbor
Software Engineer, Data
Like this role? Get carefully selected jobs like it, twice a week, straight to your inbox.
Free, no spam. Unsubscribe anytime.