Spclst , Data Platform Engineering

Responsibilities

• Platform Architecture & Automation
• Design and evolve the architecture for a scalable analytics engineering platform, centered on dbt Cloud and GitHub-driven CI/CD.
• Establish deployment patterns and environment strategies (dev/test/prod) for dbt projects, including dependency management and release controls.
• Build automation around platform operations (quality gates, approvals, notifications, versioning, documentation generation).
• Data CI/CD with GitHub & GitHub Actions
• Implement and maintain GitHub Actions workflows for data pipeline preparation and deployment, including:
• Pull request validation (dbt compile, dbt build/test, linting, docs checks)
• Merge-to-main deployment orchestration (dbt Cloud job triggers, environment promotion)
• Scheduled workflows (nightly validation runs, drift detection, metadata checks)
• Create reusable workflow templates and “golden path” pipelines for dbt repositories.
• Integrate CI/CD with code quality and security tooling (secret scanning, dependency alerts, branch protection alignment).dbt Cloud Architecture & Enablement
• Own/guide dbt Cloud project setup, job design, scheduling strategy, and environment configuration.
• Define conventions for dbt Cloud job separation (CI jobs vs deployment jobs), including job triggers from GitHub events.
• Improve performance and reliability of dbt runs (state-aware builds, selective execution patterns, artifact usage).
• Support authentication/authorization patterns across dbt Cloud, GitHub, and data warehouse. Standards, Governance & Best Practices
• Establish and enforce GitHub best practices for data development:
• branching strategy, PR templates, CODEOWNERS, semantic versioning/tagging
• standardized repository structure for dbt projects and shared packages
• Define release processes for data transformations (promotion, approvals, rollback approach).
• Improve developer experience through documentation, onboarding guides, and internal enablement.
• Collaboration & Continuous Improvement
• Partner with data stakeholders to identify pain points and deliver architectural improvements.
• Provide technical leadership on CI/CD patterns for analytics engineering and platform modernization.
• Monitor pipeline health and drive ongoing improvement
• Required
• 4+ years in data engineering, analytics engineering, or platform engineering with strong CI/CD ownership.
• Strong hands-on experience with GitHub (PR workflows, branch protections, repo governance).
• Strong hands-on experience building GitHub Actions workflows (YAML, reusable workflows, secrets, environments).
• Strong experience with dbt Cloud (projects, jobs, environments, CI features, artifacts).
• Proven experience designing deployment workflows and automation for data platforms.
• Strong SQL and solid understanding of data warehouse patterns (e.g., Snowflake/BigQuery/Redshift/Databricks SQL).
• Who we are We are known as Merck & Co., Inc., Rahway, New Jersey, USA in the United States and Canada and MSD everywhere else. For more than a century, we have been inventing for life, bringing forward medicines and vaccines for many of the world's most challenging diseases. Today, our company continues to be at the forefront of research to deliver innovative health solutions and advance the prevention and treatment of diseases that threaten people and animals around the world.
• What we look for Imagine getting up in the morning for a job as important as helping to save and improve lives around the world. Here, you have that opportunity. You can put your empathy, creativity, digital mastery, or scientific genius to work in collaboration with a diverse group of colleagues who pursue and bring hope to countless people who are battling some of the most challenging diseases of our time. Our team is constantly evolving, so if you are among the intellectually curious, join us—and start making your impact today.
• #MSDHYDIT
• Search Firm Representatives Please Read Carefully Merck & Co., Inc., Rahway, NJ, USA, also known as Merck Sharp & Dohme LLC, Rahway, NJ, USA, does not accept unsolicited assistance from search firms for employment opportunities. All CVs / resumes submitted by search firms to any employee at our company without a valid written search agreement in place for this position will be deemed the sole property of our company. No fee will be paid in the event a candidate is hired by our company as a result of an agency referral where no pre-existing agreement is in place. Where agency agreements are in place, introductions are position specific. Please, no phone calls or emails.
• Employee Status:
• Relocation:
• VISA Sponsorship:
• Travel Requirements:
• Flexible Work Arrangements:
• Shift:
• Valid Driving License:
• Hazardous Material(s):
• Job Posting End Date:
• A job posting is effective until 11:59:59PM on the day BEFORE the listed job posting end date. Please ensure you apply to a job posting no later than the day BEFORE the job posting end date.
• Requisition ID: R414520