# Principal Data Engineer

> Vivo Energy · Cape Town, South Africa · Full-time · Posted 2026-07-02

**Workplace:** on_site

**Department:** Data analytics

## Description

**Role Overview**

Reporting to the Data & Analytics Lead, the Principal Data Engineer is a hands-on role, combining the building and optimisation of production data pipelines with the technical leadership needed to raise engineering standards and develop the people around them. The role functions as a key interface between a) business stakeholders and department heads, b) the wider data and analytics team, and c) owners of source systems and data in Finance and IT.

**Key Responsibilities**

-   Designing and building robust, production-grade data pipelines on Databricks, making appropriate use of current platform capabilities such as Spark Declarative Pipelines (SDP)
-   Working “under the hood” to optimise the platform for performance and cost — tuning compute, jobs and queries, managing storage and table layout, and keeping platform spend under control
-   Defining and maintaining consistent business metrics and a semantic layer (for example, using Metric Views) so reporting is built on trusted, reusable definitions
-   Integrating data from core business systems, including SAP S/4HANA, and other sources, using tools such as Fivetran (both SaaS connectors and HVR)
-   Setting and upholding engineering standards across the team — code quality, testing, documentation, CI/CD and data governance
-   Coaching and mentoring junior and mid-level engineers, reviewing their work and helping them develop
-   Partnering with business stakeholders to understand their needs, shape practical solutions and ensure the platform delivers genuine value
-   Engaging data owners in Finance and IT to ensure data is well understood, valid and fit for purpose, and initiating data quality improvements where required

## Requirements

Skills & Experience

**Experience**

-   At least 3 years of hands-on, daily Databricks experience, covering both pipeline development and under-the-hood performance and cost optimisation
-   Up to date with recent platform developments, such as Spark Declarative Pipelines (SDP) and Metric Views
-   Strong proficiency in programming languages commonly used in data engineering, such as Python, SQL and Spark
-   Advanced experience with data manipulation, data modelling, database design and query optimization
-   Experience managing or coaching junior developers
-   A track record of managing and influencing business stakeholders
-   Experience working with SAP S/4HANA data sets, Fivetran (including both SaaS connectors and HVR), Power BI semantic modelling would be beneficial

**Key Competencies**

-   Combining deep, hands-on engineering skill with sound judgement about cost, performance and long-term maintainability
-   Coaching, mentoring and raising the capability of less experienced engineers
-   Collaborating, communicating confidently and influencing business stakeholders
-   Breaking down complex technical concepts and explaining them simply to non-technical audiences
-   Staying current with a fast-moving platform and bringing new capabilities into everyday practice
-   Taking ownership and driving work independently, from concept through to production

**Important to note:**

This role requires full-time office-based attendance, five days per week.

**To apply**

Qualified candidates to apply by uploading a cover letter and a recent resume by close on business **31 July 2026**.

## Apply

[Apply at Vivo Energy](https://apply.workable.com/vivo-energy/j/DF0441590E/apply)

---
Powered by [Workable](https://www.workable.com)