Azure Data Engineer

Day in the life of a Data Engineer at MSF

You start your day with the bi-weekly operational update from the OPS department to hear what is going on in our projects and missions for instance on our Cholera project in Goma or our emergency response in Ukraine. Then it’s time to get to your engineering work. You consult with your stakeholders during a short daily stand-up on how to properly extract the data from one of our HR systems and properly transform it in our Azure SQL DB, ready to be used for analytics.

As you will be at least coding 50% of the time that day, you have plenty of time focusing on the development of this data pipeline in Azure Data Factory and by a script calling an API. Related to this is the setup & maintenance of our MSF Azure Central Data Hub infrastructure, fixing bugs, improving code base (optimizing queries for instance). Data evangelism and project management (the stand-ups, retros and alignment with the different stakeholders) will also demand some time that day but you manage to sparkle enthusiasm of your achievements so far.

Your works matters and by creating automated systems for MSF and create-fit-for-analytics datasets, automating workflows and processes you help the organization make better decisions. In the late afternoon you have a brainstorming about the plentiful opportunities to automate monitoring and data quality checks for other projects, and to identify a possible implementation of a ML model into production that a data scientist has created. We work on the latest cutting-edge Azure tech-stack.

At the end of the day, as it happens to be Friday, you join the data team for a well-earned drink!

Place in the organisation

The Data engineer reports to the Head of the Project Management Office and is part of the Reporting & Analytics team, but with close functional working relationships with IT and other internal and external stakeholders.

Next to standardizing our Business Intelligence offerings, we broaden our scope of the Data & Analytics product portfolio to empower the MSF-wide movement to do their own reporting and analytics through a Self-Service BI approach and we move towards more (advanced) analytics. We require a Data Engineer to provide technical know-how and further develop, strengthen and maintain our central Data Hub and deliver on well-architected set of data pipelines to service the various stakeholders within the organization.

Objectives and characteristics of the role

As an Azure data engineer at MSF, you will be responsible for unlocking, structuring and preparing data for numerous stakeholders. You process data in our Azure-based Central Data Hub (CDH) , whi ch consists of various data sources for domains such as HR, Field Operations, Fundraising CRM and L gistics . You will further strengthen our CDH, develop data pipelines (e.g., Azure Data Factory) and ensure it functions properly within the infrastructure and make them ‘ready for use’. In this way, supervisors and other end users can immediately get to work with the data.

In addition, as a technical consultant you try to increase the data quality within the CDH , which you can only do if you know the content and meaning of the data. Furthermore, the CDH receives privacy-sensitive data from internal and external parties, so you will take security aspects into account. You will also perform DataOps and DevOps work, with the aim of rolling out changes as quickly and easily as possible in an automated manner. You are part of the Reporting & Analytics team (4 colleagues) and will work closely to gether with data management specialists, IT architects, data security and privacy officers and our various stakeholders all across MSF .

Main Responsibilities

Main responsibilities of the Azure Data Engineer are:

• Implement and maintain robust data pipelines that manage and secure the flow of structured and unstructured data from multiple sources towards end-users (internal and increasingly external). This can be data extracted from multiple databases that need to be stored in our central SQL database, or data from a wide array of external sources that can be ingested through API’s for instance.
• Building orchestrated jobs to move data from different sources to Azure Data Lake Storage or our SQL database, including across different layers in Azure;
• You strive for an optimal architecture by taking Microsoft’s Well-Architected Review framework into account (Security, Cost Optimization, Operational Excellence, Performance Efficiency and Reliability) and by working closely together with IT and the Data Security Officer;
• You extract, transform, validate and clean up data to meet functional and non-functional (Self-Service) Business Intelligence requirements;

• As we move more towards advanced analytics you help deploying models into production and maintain a continuous integration pipeline, including monitoring and optimizing system performance and cost;

• Since Azure is a rapidly changing world, you will learn and stay up-to-date in the latest tools and services in the Azure ecosystem;

• Follow up with super users to guarantee ongoing support. All done closely together with MSF OCA and International Team;

Candidate Profile

Technical skills

• You hold a Bachelor’s or Master’s degree (preferably in Computer Science or similar);
• You have at least 1.5 years of working experience as a Data Engineer, preferably with technologies like Microsoft Azure Data Lake Storage, Azure Data Factory, Azure Databricks, Cosmos DB and Azure SQL Server and/or Synapse Analytics;
• You have experience in at least one of the following areas: setting up cloud-based data pipelines, deploying machine learning models or designing a data infrastructure in the Cloud;
• You have experience and knowledge of (relational) databases, data modelling , reporting, data warehouses, metadata and ETL with Microsoft SQL Server and/or SSIS, SSAS, SSRS;
• You are familiar with analytical tools like Power BI, or similar, and have experience with T-SQL and data modelling;
• You are familiar with at least one of the following programming languages : Python, Java or Spark.

Soft skills

• You have experience working in Agile/ Scrum teams;
• You are service-oriented and demonstrate initiative with a good follow-up attitude;
• Excellent communication skills in English.

Nice to have

• You have working experience in an international environment, with daily collaboration with and within multicu ltural groups, preferably for a large INGO;
• You are certified in DP-200 and preferably also in DP-201 (Azure Data Engineer).

We offer

A challenging position within a stimulating, professional working environment in a major international organisation. A challenging experience within an INGO.

A 1-year Dutch employment contract based on 40 hours per week. The contract is for one year with renewal option (subject to performance and budget approval ) based on a fulltime appointment (40 hours/week) .

A gross monthly salary in scale 7 between € 3,488 and € 4,980 depending on professional experience, based on fulltime ap pointment.

Attractive secondary benefits (e.g., 30 holidays and a premium-free pension).

The position is based in the MSF office of Amsterdam, with a minimum presence in the office for the need of the work.

Your career path within MSF is a journey, with Learning & Development (L&D) as one of your loyal companions. From the moment you are recruited until the moment you decide to explore new horizons outside of MSF, L&D will support you with a variety of learning and development opportunities

Remote working is possible, if you are located somewhere other than Netherlands , we can only contract in another country where we have an MSF office. The local contract and salary grid of your country of domicile will then apply.