ROLE OVERVIEWSolarWinds is hiring a Senior Manager, Data Platform Engineering to build and lead the team responsible for administering and configuring the Enterprise Data tech stack - Fivetran, BigQuery, Dataplex, dbt, and Tableau. This person will set technical direction and architecture standards across the platform, and build, coach, and grow the team that executes day to day.
This is a working-manager (player-coach) role, not a pure people-management position: the team is small today, and this person is expected to stay technically close to the platform - setting patterns and making architecture calls, and personally covering tech-stack administration the team hasn't yet grown to cover - while delegating hands-on execution to their report(s) where it exists.
You'll balance hands-on technical leadership with people management - coaching your team, setting goals, and representing the platform in cross-functional planning with adjacent teams.
KEY RESPONSIBILITIESTeam leadership & people management- Lead, coach, and grow the Data Platform Engineering team - starting with one direct report, with a plan to scale as workload and budget allow.
- Run regular 1:1s, set clear goals, and manage performance and career development for direct report(s).
- Own hiring for the team as it grows, partnering with People and the hiring committee on leveling and comp.
Platform architecture & technical direction- Own architecture standards and technical roadmap across the Enterprise Data tech stack - Fivetran, BigQuery, Dataplex, dbt, and Tableau.
- Make build-vs-buy and platform-pattern decisions that shape how the team executes day to day.
- Stay hands-on enough to unblock the team on hard technical problems, without personally owning routine operational work.
Data tech stack administration & configuration- Ensure Fivetran, BigQuery, Dataplex, dbt, and Tableau are properly administered and configured - access, environments, and platform settings across the stack.
- Own dbt Cloud platform administration (environments, scheduling, CI/CD, access); model development and transformation logic remain with Data Engineering.
- Own Tableau platform administration (user access, groups, permissions, licensing), scaling this to a dedicated hire as the team grows.
- Set and maintain configuration standards so the stack stays consistent, secure, and auditable as the team scales.
Execution oversight- Ensure the team's reliability, cost, and governance commitments - across ingestion, BigQuery, Dataplex/PII access, dbt, and Tableau - are being met.
- Review and prioritise the team's operational backlog against the platform roadmap.
Cross-functional partnership- Represent the Data Platform Engineering pillar in planning with Data Engineering, Data Governance, Cloud Security, and Business Intelligence.
- Negotiate priorities and dependencies with adjacent teams on the team's behalf, rather than leaving individual engineers to manage those relationships alone.
REQUIRED EXPERIENCETechnical depth- Deep, hands-on background in Google Cloud Platform, BigQuery, and Dataplex - enough to retain technical credibility and keep setting standards for the team.
- Hands-on experience administering and configuring dbt (or a comparable transformation platform) and Fivetran (or a comparable ELT tool).
- Experience administering Tableau or a comparable BI platform - permissions, licensing, and platform configuration.
- Track record of technical leadership - driving standards, mentoring engineers, or leading initiatives - even without formal management experience.
Leadership experience- Experience or demonstrated readiness to lead a technical team - formal people-management experience is helpful but not required.
- Demonstrated ability to balance architecture/strategic work with hands-on operational realities.
- Strong communication skills - able to represent the team's priorities and trade-offs to peers and senior leadership.
PREFERRED EXPERIENCE- Prior experience leading or mentoring a technical team, even informally (tech lead, staff-level mentorship, project leadership).
- Experience scaling a team from one or two people to a larger group.
