Senior Staff IT Data Platform Engineer

Our Mission

At Palo Alto Networks® everything starts and ends with our mission:

Being the cybersecurity partner of choice, protecting our digital way of life.
Our vision is a world where each day is safer and more secure than the one before. We are a company built on the foundation of challenging and disrupting the way things are done, and we’re looking for innovators who are as committed to shaping the future of cybersecurity as we are.

Who We Are

We take our mission of protecting the digital way of life seriously. We are relentless in protecting our customers and we believe that the unique ideas of every member of our team contributes to our collective success. Our values were crowdsourced by employees and are brought to life through each of us everyday - from disruptive innovation and collaboration, to execution. From showing up for each other with integrity to creating an environment where we all feel included.

As a member of our team, you will be shaping the future of cybersecurity. We work fast, value ongoing learning, and we respect each employee as a unique individual. Knowing we all have different needs, our development and personal wellbeing programs are designed to give you choice in how you are supported. This includes our FLEXBenefits wellbeing spending account with over 1,000 eligible items selected by employees, our mental and financial health resources, and our personalized learning opportunities - just to name a few!

At Palo Alto Networks, we believe in the power of collaboration and value in-person interactions. This is why our employees generally work full time from our office with flexibility offered where needed. This setup fosters casual conversations, problem-solving, and trusted relationships. Our goal is to create an environment where we all win with precision.

Your Career

Our Data & Analytics group is responsible for working with various business owners/stakeholders from Sales, Marketing, People, GCS, Infosec, Operations, and Finance to solve complex business problems which will have a direct impact on the metrics defined to showcase the progress of Palo Alto Networks. We leverage the latest technologies from the Cloud & Big Data ecosystem to improve business outcomes and create through prototyping, Proof-of-Concept projects and application development.

We are looking for a Sr. Data Platform Engineer with extensive experience in data engineering, cloud infrastructure, and a strong background in DevOps, SRE, or system engineering. The ideal candidate will be responsible for designing, implementing, and maintaining the scalable, reliable platforms and data transformations that support our business objectives. This role requires a deep understanding of both data engineering principles and platform automation, as well as the ability to collaborate with cross-functional teams to deliver high-quality data solutions.

This is an in-office role in our HQ (Santa Clara, CA).

Your Impact

• Design, develop, and maintain data pipelines to extract, transform, and load (ETL) data from various sources into our data warehouse or data lake environment.

• Automate, manage, and scale the underlying infrastructure for our data platforms (e.g., Airflow, Spark clusters), applying SRE and DevOps best practices for performance, reliability, and observability.

• Collaborate with stakeholders to gather requirements and translate business needs into robust technical and platform solutions.

• Optimize and tune existing data pipelines and infrastructure for performance, cost, and scalability.

• Implement and enforce data quality and governance processes to ensure data accuracy, consistency, and compliance with regulatory standards.

• Work closely with the BI team to design and develop dashboards, reports, and analytical tools that provide actionable insights to stakeholders.

• Mentor junior members of the team and provide guidance on best practices for data engineering, platform development, and DevOps.

• (Nice-to-have) Aptitude for proactively identifying and implementing GenAI-driven solutions to achieve measurable improvements in the reliability and performance of data pipelines or to optimize key processes like data quality validation and root cause analysis for data issues.

Your Experience 

• Bachelor's degree in Computer Science, Engineering, or a related field.

• 5+ years of experience in data engineering, platform engineering, or a similar role, with a strong focus on building and maintaining data pipelines and the underlying infrastructure.

• Must have proven experience in a DevOps, SRE, or System Engineering role, with hands-on expertise in infrastructure as code (e.g., Terraform, Ansible), CI/CD pipelines, and monitoring/observability tools.

• Expertise in SQL programming and database management systems (e.g., BigQuery).

• Hands-on experience with ETL tools and technologies (e.g., Apache Spark, Apache Airflow).

• Experience with cloud platforms such as Google Cloud Platform (GCP), and experience with relevant services (e.g., GCP Dataflow, GCP DataProc, BigQuery, Cloud Composer, GKE).

• Experience with Big Data tools like Spark, Kafka, etc.

• Experience with object-oriented/object function scripting languages: Python/Scala, etc.

• (Nice-to-have) Demonstrated readiness to leverage GenAI tools to enhance efficiency within the typical stages of the data engineering lifecycle, for example by generating complex SQL queries, creating initial Python/Spark script structures, or auto-generating pipeline documentation.

• (Plus) Experience with BI tools and visualization platforms (e.g., Tableau).

• (Plus) Experience with SAP HANA, SAP BW, SAP ECC, or other SAP modules.

• Strong analytical and problem-solving skills, with the ability to analyze complex data sets and derive actionable insights.

• Excellent communication and interpersonal skills, with the ability to collaborate effectively with cross-functional teams.

The Team

Working at a high-tech cybersecurity company within Information Technology is a once-in-a-lifetime opportunity. You’ll join the brightest minds in technology, creating, building, and supporting tools and enabling our global teams on the front line of defense against cyberattacks.

We’re connected by one mission but driven by the impact of that mission and what it means to protect our way of life in the digital age. Join a dynamic and fast-paced team of people who feel excited by the prospect of a challenge and feel a thrill at resolving technical gaps that inhibit productivity.

Compensation Disclosure

The compensation offered for this position will depend on qualifications, experience, and work location. For candidates who receive an offer at the posted level, the starting base salary (for non-sales roles) or base salary + commission target (for sales/commissioned roles) is expected to be between $122000/YR- $197000/YR. The offered compensation may also include restricted stock units and a bonus. A description of our employee benefits may be found here. 

Our Commitment

We’re problem solvers that take risks and challenge cybersecurity’s status quo. It’s simple: we can’t accomplish our mission without diverse teams innovating, together.

We are committed to providing reasonable accommodations for all qualified individuals with a disability. If you require assistance or accommodation due to a disability or special need, please contact us at  [email protected].

Palo Alto Networks is an equal opportunity employer. We celebrate diversity in our workplace, and all qualified applicants will receive consideration for employment without regard to age, ancestry, color, family or medical care leave, gender identity or expression, genetic information, marital status, medical condition, national origin, physical or mental disability, political affiliation, protected veteran status, race, religion, sex (including pregnancy), sexual orientation, or other legally protected characteristics.

All your information will be kept confidential according to EEO guidelines.