Principal Data Engineer Job Listing at Norfolk Southern in Atlanta, GA (Job ID 1311274700)

Description

Requisition 38967: B5 - Principal Data Engineer 

Please note, applying for a position outside of your department will require a departmental release.

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Primary Purpose:

The Principal Data Engineer is responsible for designing, governing, and optimizing Norfolk Southern's enterprise analytics ecosystem, anchored by Databricks on AWS, Power BI, and Collibra. This role serves as a leader on the Data Products team for leading collaboration with IT to deliver a data ecosystem that meets current and future business needs efficiently. The role will support designing self-service analytics, enforcing data governance, and integrating cross-platform workflows. The position emphasize scalability, security, and business alignment across our analytics stack.

Principal Duties:

• Design and implement cloud-native analytics solutions using Databricks on AWS as the core ETL and modeling platform.
• Lead analytics team working on migrating legacy data architecture to cloud-native solutions, collaborating closely with IT.
• Define Power BI workspace architecture, dataset publishing strategy, and capacity planning for scalable access to curated data.
• Establish best practices for dataset certification, semantic modeling, and metadata lineage to support governed self-service BI.
• Collaborate with IT cloud infrastructure teams to ensure alignment between Databricks on AWS and Power BI in Azure.
• Integrate Collibra with Databricks to support automated metadata harvesting, governance workflows, and lineage tracking.
• Support Power Platform integration (Power BI, PowerApps, Power Automate) for operational mobility and workflow automation.
• Develop and maintain technical documentation, security patterns, and architectural standards to ensure scalable data product delivery.
• Partner with MDM and data governance leads to ensure that technical design aligns with domain-level data ownership and stewardship policies.

Required Qualifications:

Experience:

• 5+ years in data architecture, analytics engineering, or business intelligence delivery.
• Hands-on experience with cloud-native data infrastructure, preferably Databricks on AWS, including Delta Lake, Unity Catalog, and Spark-based ETL workflows.
• Proven ability to scale and support enterprise Power BI environments, including Premium Capacity and workspace governance.
• Exposure to hybrid cloud environments and managing cross-cloud data flows (AWS to Azure).
• Familiarity with Collibra or equivalent governance tools for data cataloging and stewardship workflows.
• Demonstrated experience leading technical strategy across product, engineering, and infrastructure teams.

Skills:

• Strong understanding of semantic modeling, DAX, dataset optimization, and performance tuning in Power BI.
• Knowledge of data access security, including row-level security (RLS), Azure AD integration, and IAM best practices.
• Excellent communication skills with the ability to interface between technical and business stakeholders.
• Ability to navigate matrixed organizations and deliver in fast-paced, product-driven environments.

Preferred Qualifications:

• Experience designing analytics solutions in a hybrid environment (e.g., Databricks on AWS + Power BI in Azure).
• Familiarity with Microsoft Fabric, Direct Lake, and XMLA endpoint integration.
• Experience with PowerApps and Power Automate as part of operational reporting and workflow initiatives.
• Background in Agile or DevOps approaches to data product delivery.

Company Overview

Since 1827, Norfolk Southern Corporation (NYSE: NSC) and its predecessor companies have safely moved the goods and materials that drive the U.S. economy. Today, it operates a customer-centric and operations-driven freight transportation network. Committed to furthering sustainability, Norfolk Southern helps its customers avoid 15 million tons of yearly carbon emissions by shipping via rail. Its dedicated team members deliver more than 7 million carloads annually, from agriculture to consumer goods, and is the largest rail shipper of auto products and metals in North America. Norfolk Southern also has the most extensive intermodal network in the eastern U.S., serving a majority of the country's population and manufacturing base, with connections to every major container port on the Atlantic coast as well as the Gulf of Mexico and Great Lakes. Learn more by visiting www.NorfolkSouthern.com.

At Norfolk Southern, we believe in celebrating our individuality. By leveraging the unique backgrounds and viewpoints of our employees, we can create a culture of innovation, respect, and inclusion. We know that employees thrive in a workplace where differing viewpoints, ideas, and experiences are freely shared and valued. As such, we encourage all employees to contribute their distinctive skills and capabilities to our organization.

Equal employment opportunities are available to all applicants regardless of race, color, religion, age, sex, national origin, disability status, genetic information, veteran status, sexual orientation, and gender identity. Together, we power progress.