Director, Data Strategy & Engineering (India Team)
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Monthly Salary:
Posted on:
10 hours ago
Vacancies:
1 Vacancy
Job Summary
Portage Point Partners is a Chicago headquartered middle market focused advisory interim management and investment banking firm with a national footprint across ten US offices. It delivers deeply integrated cross functional solutions across Transaction Advisory Valuations Investment Banking Turnaround & Restructuring Performance Improvement Transaction Execution Services and Office of the CFO services. Backed by 160 experts with blue-chip consulting finance operations and investing backgrounds the firm brings a uniquely holistic perspective to complex financial and operational situations.
The firm is known for its high impact high pace execution model and has grown rapidly since inception in 2016.
The Director Data Strategy & Engineering role at Portage Point represents a unique opportunity to define and execute the firms data platform vision for the India delivery organization. This Director will own the strategic direction of all data assets architecture governance and capability building that underpin the firms AI product portfolio and consulting analytics services spanning high-value use cases including commercial and financial due diligence (CDD/FDD) value creation tracking working capital optimization restructuring scenario analysis portfolio company performance benchmarking and management information system (MIS) intelligence layers. Reporting to the India Delivery Leader as a peer to the Director AI Solutions and partnering closely with US-based Practice Line Leaders this Director will lead a team of two to three Vice Presidents and their Senior Associates (approximately 15 to 20 professionals) across data engineering analytics engineering and data governance owning hiring vendor partner management and capability development across the function. This person will operate as a true data executive within the India capability centre influencing how data is collected structured governed and commercialized across the firms global consulting practice and representing the firm externally as a subject matter expert on data strategy in deal advisory and portfolio management. If you are a senior data leader with deep technical depth and a consulting or professional services background who wants to define how data and AI transform a high-growth advisory firm this is the right role for you.
Responsibilities
- Define and own the firms data platform strategy for the India delivery organization spanning cloud data architecture AI data infrastructure master data management and the analytics capability roadmap
- Drive architectural decisions for the firms data ecosystem including data lakehouse design (bronze/silver/gold medallion architecture) real-time versus batch processing trade-offs semantic layer strategy data mesh adoption and AI-ready data product frameworks
- Own the data architecture review function ensuring all new AI products and data pipelines meet architectural security and governance standards before development commences
- Execute the data strategy that enables the AI Solutions product roadmap defining how data is structured labeled versioned and served to AI/ML models across consulting use cases including CDD/FDD automation value creation tracking working capital optimization restructuring scenario engines portfolio benchmarking and MIS intelligence layers
- Drive the development of the firms proprietary financial and industry data assets including training data curation golden datasets for model evaluation and benchmarking databases
- Design the firms knowledge graph strategy capturing structured relationships between companies deal comparables management teams and operational KPIs to power next-generation AI reasoning
- Oversee design and operation of scalable ELT/ETL pipelines ingesting structured and unstructured data from diverse sources including financial data providers (Capital IQ Refinitiv PitchBook Bloomberg) client ERP/CRM systems SEC filings management packs and market research
- Own the analytics engineering layer powering consulting analytics including financial benchmarking working capital KPI dashboards EBITDA bridge models and cost structure analyses and build reusable data product templates that let consulting teams rapidly spin up client-specific analytics environments
- Lead and develop a team of two to three Vice Presidents and their Senior Associates (approximately 15 to 20 professionals) across data engineering analytics engineering and data governance providing strategic and technical direction conducting structured performance reviews and owning career development
- Drive talent strategy for the Data Strategy & Engineering function including hiring plans role design vendor partner selection and management capability building career ladders and compensation benchmarking in partnership with HR
- Drive the data governance framework including policies standards stewardship model and compliance controls for handling client deal data portfolio company data and third-party data in alignment with NDA and regulatory obligations
- Oversee data security architecture in collaboration with the security function with particular attention to AI training data handling model output retention and deal data segregation
- Build and operate data quality programs including automated monitoring anomaly detection and alerting to surface data issues before they affect AI model outputs or consulting deliverables
- Partner with the India Delivery Leader the Director AI Solutions and US-based Practice Line Leaders to translate firm priorities into a sequenced data platform roadmap with measurable business outcomes and report on platform-level KPIs including adoption data quality freshness SLAs productivity impact and ROI
- Identify and shape data monetization opportunities within the firms consulting practice including proprietary benchmarking databases index products and data-as-a-service offerings and partner with firm leadership to commercialize proprietary data assets as consulting IP and competitive differentiators
- Serve as a thought leader on data strategy in deal advisory and portfolio management engaging in senior client conversations on data room analytics portfolio data standardization and data-driven value creation and representing the firm at internal forums and external industry events where appropriate
- Manage relationships with third-party data providers evaluate new data sources for relevance to consulting use cases and lead the evaluation and adoption of emerging data technologies including data mesh federated query engines and AI-native data platforms
- Contribute selectively as a hands-on technical leader on flagship initiatives where senior architectural judgment is required
- Lead firm-wide knowledge sharing training and change management efforts to scale data and analytics capability across practice lines
- Support business development by shaping data-related proposals client presentations and solution demonstrations
- Support internal trainings and best practice sharing
- Contribute to a high-performing inclusive and values-driven culture
Qualifications
- Bachelors of Technology / Engineering and / or Masters in Computer Science Data Engineering Information Systems Statistics or related technical field from a top undergraduate program; MBA with quantitative focus strongly preferred
- Willing to relocate to or be primarily present in Gurgaon
- Ability to collaborate across global time zones including US-based teams
- Ten to fifteen years of progressive experience in AI/ML software engineering or related technical disciplines with a meaningful portion of that experience in management consulting professional services or private equity-backed advisory environments
- Demonstrated experience leading AI or technology functions of 10 or more professionals including managing managers and developing senior individual contributors
- Proven track record setting product or portfolio roadmaps for AI data or software functions and translating ambiguous business priorities into sequenced delivery plans
- Track record building and scaling teams including direct hiring leadership and experience managing vendor or offshore delivery partners
- Deep working knowledge of LLM-powered applications agentic AI architectures automation workflows and the modern AI tooling ecosystem (e.g. OpenAI Claude LangChain N8N Zapier or similar)
- Proficiency with AI coding tools such as Claude Code and the ability to engage credibly in technical reviews and architectural decisions
- Strong understanding of data engineering model evaluation MLOps and modern software development practices
- Demonstrated ability to establish and enforce responsible AI standards including bias detection explainability and data privacy across production AI systems
- Experience operating in client-facing or executive-facing settings with the ability to shape AI-related proposals presentations and senior stakeholder conversations
- Superior written and verbal communication skills including executive-ready presentation and reporting skills
- Proven ability to thrive in lean fast-moving teams
- High attention to detail responsiveness and ownership mindset
- Track record of success in high-pressure environments
- Ability to convey technical concepts to non-technical stakeholders
We may use artificial intelligence (AI) tools to support parts of the hiring process such as reviewing applications analyzing resumes or assessing responses. These tools assist our recruitment team but do not replace human judgment. Final hiring decisions are ultimately made by humans. If you would like more information about how your data is processed please contact us.
Required Experience:
Director
