Senior Data Engineer at Mactores - AWS Cloud Stack in Columbus
Career & Market Insight
This role sits at an interesting intersection of consulting delivery and hands-on data engineering — rare in a market where many "senior" roles are actually maintenance or support-heavy. The forward-deployed model means you'll build real production systems with contractually committed outcomes, which translates to strong portfolio material.
Skills developed: You'll deepen expertise across a high-demand AWS data stack — EMR, Glue, Redshift, Athena, Airflow, and Snowflake. PySpark and multi-warehouse SQL fluency are consistently among the top 10 most-requested data engineering skills. The addition of AI-augmented tooling (Aedeon) also positions you on the leading edge of agent-assisted engineering workflows.
Compensation context: No rate is listed, which is a yellow flag for freelance postings. Senior AWS data engineers typically command $90–$150/hour on contract in North America, and $60–$100/hour globally. Clarify the rate structure and whether engagements offer consistent hours before committing.
Green flags:
- Real production ownership, not staff augmentation into someone else's backlog
- Exposure to AI-assisted tooling (Aedeon) — a differentiator on your resume
- Project-by-project structure lets you build a diverse AWS client portfolio quickly
Yellow flags:
- No stated compensation range — negotiate clearly upfront
- Deadline-driven cutovers can create high-pressure periods
- Freelance means no traditional benefits (health, PTO, retirement)
This role suits engineers who want high-impact delivery work and are building toward a principal engineer or independent consultant career path.
Mactores is the agent-native AWS modernization firm. Most modernization work doesn't ship — it stalls in pilots, slips a year, or lands at three times the budget. We exist to ship it: production systems running, legacy retired, outcomes measured. Our delivery is built on Aedeon, the agent platform built by Mactores' founders' sister company, which absorbs the repetitive 60–70% of engagement work — discovery, dependency mapping, validation, test generation — that traditional consulting bills human hours against. Forward-deployed engineers own the rest: architecture, judgment, and cutover, on dates we commit to in the contract.
This is a senior freelance role in our Data Platform Modernization pillar: consolidating and migrating customer data infrastructure on AWS in weeks, not quarters. Customers come to us after a data program has stalled — pipelines nobody trusts, warehouses nobody runs new workloads on, a modernization that produced diagrams instead of production systems.
Aedeon handles automated source discovery, schema mapping, lineage extraction, and parallel-run validation. You take the work that needs a senior engineer's judgment: pipeline builds on EMR and Glue, data models for Redshift, Snowflake, Athena, and Presto, Airflow orchestration, and the troubleshooting that gets a system stable enough to cut over. Freelance here means real delivery work on real engagements — not staff augmentation into someone else's backlog.
What You Will Do
- Build and maintain data pipelines on Amazon EMR or Amazon Glue that run in production.
- Design data models and end-user querying on Amazon Redshift or Snowflake, Amazon Athena, and Presto.
- Build and maintain pipeline orchestration with Airflow.
- Work with other teams to understand data needs and design solutions that meet them.
- Troubleshoot and optimize pipelines and data models until they hold up under real load.
- Write and maintain PySpark and SQL scripts to extract, transform, and load data.
- Document and communicate technical decisions to both technical and non-technical audiences.
- Track new AWS data technologies and judge their impact on the systems we run.
What We Are Looking For
- Bachelor's degree in Computer Science, Engineering, or a related field.
- 3+ years of experience working with PySpark and SQL.
- 2+ years of experience building and maintaining data pipelines using Amazon EMR or Amazon Glue.
- 2+ years of experience with data modeling and end-user querying using Amazon Redshift or Snowflake, Amazon Athena, and Presto.
- 1+ years of experience building and maintaining pipeline orchestration using Airflow.
- Strong problem-solving and troubleshooting skills.
- Excellent communication and collaboration skills.
- Ability to work independently and within a team environment.
Preferred Qualifications
- AWS Data Analytics Specialty Certification
- Experience with Agile development methodology
How We Work
We run a forward-deployed model: engineers embed with delivery teams, own their piece of the outcome, and ship against committed dates. This is a remote freelance engagement — you work project-by-project inside that model, with Aedeon absorbing the repetitive layer so your billed time goes to engineering judgment, not manual validation. You'll work independently, coordinate closely with the engagement team, and your output lands in production systems that customers sign off on.
Life at Mactores
We care about creating a culture that makes a real difference in the lives of every Mactorian. Our 10 Core Leadership Principles — honoring Decision-making, Leadership, Collaboration, and Curiosity — drive how we work:
- Be one step ahead
- Deliver the best
- Be bold
- Pay attention to the detail
- Enjoy the challenge
- Be curious and take action
- Take leadership
- Own it
- Deliver value
- Be collaborative
Read more about the work culture at https://mactores.com/careers
The Path to Joining the Mactores Team
At Mactores, our recruitment process is structured around three distinct stages:
- Pre-Employment Assessment: A series of evaluations of your technical proficiency and suitability for the role.
- Managerial Interview: The hiring manager engages with you in multiple discussions (30 minutes to an hour each), covering technical skills, hands-on experience, leadership potential, and communication.
- HR Discussion: A 30-minute session to discuss the offer and next steps with a member of the HR team.
Mactores provides equal opportunities in all employment practices. We don't discriminate based on race, religion, gender, national origin, age, disability, marital status, military status, genetic information, or any other category protected by federal, state, and local laws. This applies to every part of the employment relationship: recruitment, compensation, promotions, transfers, disciplinary action, layoff, training, and social and recreational programs.
Note: Please answer as many questions as possible with this application to accelerate the hiring process.
Frequently Asked Questions
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