Data Architect
Company: United States Pharmacopeia
Location: Rockville
Posted on: April 4, 2026
|
|
|
Job Description:
Description Who is USP? The U.S. Pharmacopeial Convention (USP)
is an independent scientific organization that collaborates with
the world’s leading health and science experts to develop rigorous
quality standards for medicines, dietary supplements, and food
ingredients. At USP, we believe that scientific excellence is
driven by a commitment to fairness, integrity, and global
collaboration. This belief is embedded in our core value of Passion
for Quality and is demonstrated through the contributions of more
than 1,300 professionals across twenty global locations, working to
strengthen the supply of safe, high-quality medicines worldwide. At
USP, we value inclusive scientific collaboration and recognize that
attracting diverse expertise strengthens our ability to develop
trusted public health standards. We foster an organizational
culture that supports equitable access to mentorship, professional
development, and leadership opportunities. Our partnerships,
standards, and research reflect our belief that ensuring broad
participation in scientific leadership results in stronger, more
impactful outcomes for global health. USP is proud to be an equal
employment opportunity employer (EEOE) and is committed to ensuring
fair, merit-based selection processes that enable the best
scientific minds—regardless of background—to contribute to
advancing public health solutions worldwide. We provide reasonable
accommodations to individuals with disabilities and uphold policies
that create an inclusive and collaborative work environment. Brief
Job Overview This is a hands-on non-supervisory strategic position
responsible for leading the end-to-end data architecture
strategy—bridging data ingestion, transformation, governance, and
analytics—to ensure that data is accessible, high-quality, secure,
and performant across the enterprise. The role will define and
deliver data architectures and solutions as well as contribute to
the development, alignment, and implementation of IT plans in line
with the overall strategy of IT and the business. How will YOU
create impact here at USP? As part of our mission to advance
scientific rigor and public health standards, you will play a vital
role in increasing global access to high-quality medicines through
public standards and related programs. USP prioritizes scientific
integrity, regulatory excellence, and evidence-based
decision-making to ensure health systems worldwide can rely on
strong, tested, and globally relevant quality standards.
Additionally, USP’s People and Culture division, in partnership
with the Equity Office, invests in leadership and workforce
development to equip all employees with the skills to create
high-performing, inclusive teams. This includes training in
equitable management practices and tools to promote engaged,
collaborative, and results-driven work environments. The Data
Architect has the following responsibilities: Lead the data design
of solutions for large projects and programs; through expert
knowledge translate high-level business requirements into data
models and appropriate metadata, test data, and data quality
standards. Lead and support IT initiatives in developing and
management of the USP Data Lakehouse. Lead and support USP
analytics team in designing and curating data from a Data Lake for
business intelligence dashboards. Lead and support the architecting
of USP’s cloud-enabled data platforms and services including data
warehouse, systems of record and operational databases. Direct and
manage USP’s enterprise data landscaping efforts. Work with senior
business stakeholders to secure engagement for the solution and
ensure that the delivery of the project aligns with longer-term
strategic roadmaps. Simplify the existing data architecture,
delivering reusable services and cost saving opportunities in line
with the policies and standards. Lead collaborative team working
with other areas within IT to ensure that all solutions are
complete, operable, conform to business processes, and meet the
business needs with the agreed quality of service. Provide clear,
continuous, and consistent data architecture leadership at a
detailed level within projects. Lead and participate in the peer
review and quality assurance of project architectural artifacts
across the Enterprise Architecture group through governance forums.
Report key architecture decisions and implications to the
governance forums. Expected to carry out core accountabilities with
minimal level of supervision for complex tasks and no supervision
for more routine matters. Develop conceptual, logical, and physical
data models to support data analysis and business intelligence.
Create and maintain current- and target-state data architectures.
Define and manage standards, guidelines, and processes to ensure
data quality. Ensure technology solutions are in alignment with
data architecture principles and target state. Evaluate and
recommend emerging technologies for data management, storage and
analytics. Define and implement data governance frameworks,
including data lineage, cataloging, and data quality monitoring.
Ensure data compliance with security, privacy, and regulatory
requirements (e.g., GDPR, HIPAA, etc.). Collaborate with security
teams to apply IAM roles, encryption, and access control policies.
Who is USP Looking For? The successful candidate will have a
demonstrated understanding of our mission, commitment to excellence
through inclusive and equitable behaviors and practices, ability to
quickly build credibility with stakeholders, along with the
following competencies and experience: Bachelor’s degree in
Computer Science, Information Systems, or related field, or
equivalent combination of education and experience. Eight (8) years
of experience working in Information Technology. Five (5) years of
experience in data architecture, engineering, or cloud data
solutions, including a minimum of two (2) years on AWS. Ability to
relate architectural decisions and recommendations to business
needs. Strong analytical thinking and problem-solving ability.
Excellent communication skills and ability to explain complex
technical concepts to non-technical stakeholders. Proactive,
detail-oriented, and passionate about building scalable, reliable,
and efficient data systems. · Team player with a mindset of
continuous learning and innovation. Proven experience designing and
maintaining a data lakehouse or modern data platform architectures
on AWS. Hands-on experience with: AWS S3 (data lake design,
partitioning, lifecycle management). AWS Glue (ETL jobs, crawlers,
Data Catalog, schema management). AWS Redshift (data warehousing,
performance tuning, Redshift Spectrum). AWS Lambda and Step
Functions (data processing orchestration). MWAA / Apache Airflow
(workflow management). AWS Athena (ad hoc querying). AWS SageMaker
(data preparation for ML pipelines). Strong proficiency in SQL,
Python, and data modeling (dimensional, data vault, etc.).
Experience with data governance, lineage, metadata management, and
cataloging frameworks. Familiarity with CI/CD pipelines,
infrastructure as code (e.g., CloudFormation or Terraform), and
DevOps principles. Familiarity with data reporting/visualization
tools (e.g., Power BI or Tableau). Additional Desired Preferences
Experience managing the iteration, review and maintenance of data
requirements and data models. Experience developing reference
architecture, principles, and standards. Demonstrated ability to
apply data architecture design patterns and principles, including:
o Domain-driven design and data mesh concepts. o Event-driven and
microservices-based data integration patterns. o Modern data
modeling and data pipeline orchestration best practices. o
Scalability, reliability, and performance optimization strategies.
Derives an overall strategy of master data management, within an
established information architecture, that supports the development
and secure operation of information and digital services. Sets
standards for data modelling and design tools and techniques,
advises on their application, and ensures compliance. Develops
organizational policies, standards, and guidelines for data
management, aligned with ethical principles. Takes overall
responsibility for planning effective data storage, security,
quality, sharing, availability, retention, and publishing within
the organization. Plans, establishes, and manages processes for
regular and consistent access to, and independent validation of
external information from multiple sources. Supervisory
Responsibilities None, this is an individual contributor role.
Benefits USP provides the benefits to protect yourself and your
family today and tomorrow. From company-paid time off and
comprehensive healthcare options to retirement savings, you can
have peace of mind that your personal and financial well-being is
protected. Compensation Base Salary Range: USD $112,700.00 –
146,900.00 annually. Target Annual Bonus: % Varies based on level
of role. Individual compensation packages are based on various
factors unique to each candidate’s skill set, experience,
qualifications, equity, and other job-related reasons. Note: USP
does not accept unsolicited resumes from 3rd party recruitment
agencies and is not responsible for fees from recruiters or other
agencies except under specific written agreement with USP. Equal
Opportunity Employer/Protected Veterans/Individuals with
Disabilities This employer is required to notify all applicants of
their rights pursuant to federal employment laws. For further
information, please review the Know Your Rights
(https://www.eeoc.gov/poster) notice from the Department of Labor.
Job Category Information Technology Job Type Full-Time
Keywords: United States Pharmacopeia, Frederick , Data Architect, IT / Software / Systems , Rockville, Maryland
