Associate Director, Data Engineering

Our Opportunity
ChewysAI & Dataorganization is seeking anAssociate Director of Data Engineeringto lead the teams that design build and govern the data foundation powering Chewys analytics AI and decision-making capabilities.

As part of theEnterprise Data Systems (EDS)organization youll oversee Data Engineering Managers and their teamseach owning a major domain such asDiscover Engage ServeandParticipants. These teams build and govern end-to-end data products acrossSnowflakedbt CloudKafka andBI platforms(Tableau Sigma Omni Analytics).
Youll shape the long-term data architecture modernize pipelines through AI and automation and ensure every domain operates from a consistent reliable and trusted foundation. Youll lead technical direction delivery excellence and people growth while partnering closely with Product Analytics and AI platform leaders to execute Chewys enterprise data strategy.

What Youll Do
Strategic Leadership & Vision

• Define and drive the multi-year technical vision for Chewys enterprise data platform covering ingestion modeling governance and BI integration.
• Translate business and AI initiatives into a unified data engineering roadmap across domains (Discover Engage Serve Participants).
• Establish and champion platform-wide standards for architecture data modeling testing observability and governance.
• Guide domain data teams to design interoperable reusable and AI-ready data products.

Organizational Leadership & People Development

• Lead and mentor Data Engineering Managers and their teams of engineers.
• Partner with data owners across Chewy to set enterprise observability standards and champion best practices for data security and privacy ensuring compliance.
• Develop a culture rooted in accountability innovation and continuous learning.
• Foster technical excellence ensuring consistency in process and delivery across domains.
• Partner with Talent and HR to attract grow and retain top-tier data engineering and stewardship talent.

Technical Direction & Modernization

• Oversee the evolution of Chewys Snowflake and dbt Cloud architecture ensuring scale performance and cost efficiency.
• Champion real-time and event-driven architecture using Kafka and AWS-native tools.
• Guide adoption of new BI capabilities (Tableau Sigma Omni) with consistent governance and semantic layers.
• Drive standardization of reusable dbt packages shared testing frameworks and model documentation practices.

AI & Automation Enablement

• Lead the integration of AI and automation into data engineering improving quality reliability and speed.
• Partner with the AI Platform team to expose governed data products for machine learning and generative AI use cases.
• Evaluate and implement AI-assisted tools for data lineage documentation anomaly detection and self-healing pipelines.
• Promote a mindset where AI enhances the craft of data engineering rather than replacing it.

Delivery Excellence & Governance Alignment

• Oversee roadmap execution and cross-domain dependencies ensuring high-quality and predictable delivery.
• Align engineering and stewardship workstreams to deliver trusted governed and observable data.
• Partner with Product Analytics and Business leadership to ensure alignment on priorities and outcomes.
• Own KPIs for platform reliability data quality cost stewardship and delivery throughput.

Cross-Functional Partnership & Communication

• Act as a senior liaison between AI & Data Product and Business teams.
• Translate technical progress and strategy into clear narratives for executive stakeholders.
• Represent EDS in enterprise data councils architecture forums and AI leadership discussions.
• Drive alignment across Chewys ecosystem of data producers and consumers.

What Youll Need

• 10 years of experience in data engineering or analytics platform leadership including 4 years managing managers.
• Deep technical expertise in Snowflake dbt Cloud and cloud-based data pipelines (Kafka AWS).
• Strong understanding of data governance lineage and quality frameworks across warehouse and BI layers.
• Proven experience scaling teams and systems across multiple data domains.
• Strategic mindset with demonstrated ability to define and execute multi-year data roadmaps.
• Experience integrating AI and automation into engineering operations (auto-testing observability metadata enrichment).
• Exceptional communication and stakeholder management skills; able to influence technical and non-technical audiences.
• Track record of developing high-performing teams and inclusive technical cultures.

Why Youll Love This Role

• Lead the teams that make Chewys enterprise data platform the backbone of AI analytics and operational intelligence.
• Shape how data engineering and stewardship collaborate across four major domains.
• Drive modernization across Snowflake dbt Cloud Kafka and BI tools using AI to reimagine whats possible.
• Grow and mentor talented managers and senior engineers defining the next generation of data leadership at Chewy.
• Be a key voice in Chewys AI & Data leadership team helping steer how the company uses data to delight pet parents and operate smarter every day.

Required Experience:

Director