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Senior Specialist: Cloud Data Architect

Posting Country:  South Africa
Date Posted:  6 Oct 2025
Full Time / Part Time:  Full Time
Contract Type:  Permanent

At Vodacom, we’re working hard to build a better future. A more connected, inclusive and sustainable world. As a dynamic global community, it's our human spirit, together with technology, that empowers us to achieve this. 

We challenge and innovate in order to connect people, businesses, and communities across the world. Delighting our customers and earning their loyalty drive us, and we experiment, learn fast and get it done, together.

With us, you can be truly be yourself and belong, share inspiration, embrace new opportunities, thrive, and make a real difference. 
 

 

When it comes to putting people first, we're number 1. 

The number 1 Top Employer in South Africa. 
Certified by the Top Employer Institute 2025.

Role Purpose/Business Unit:

 

As the recognized authority in data and analytics architecture, the Solution Architect provides strategic guidance and technical leadership in the design, development, and implementation of enterprise-wide data and analytical solutions. This role is pivotal in translating complex business requirements into scalable, secure, and high-performing data architectures that enable advanced analytics, data-driven decision-making, and digital transformation.

Your responsibilities will include:

 

  • Enterprise Data Strategy Alignment – Ensure all data and analytics architecture designs align with the organisation’s enterprise architecture principles, business strategies, and technology roadmap.
  • Solution Design Leadership – Lead end‑to‑end design of scalable, secure, and high‑performance data platforms, including data warehouses, data lakes, streaming pipelines, and analytics platforms.
  • Stakeholder Collaboration – Partner with business, IT, and analytics leaders to translate complex business requirements into technical architectures and implementation roadmaps.
  • Technology Evaluation & Selection – Assess, recommend, and govern the adoption of data management, integration, and analytics technologies based on business needs, scalability, and total cost of ownership.
  • Standards & Best Practices – Define and enforce architectural standards, frameworks, and patterns for data modelling, governance, and security.
  • Data Governance Enablement – Support and embed data governance policies for data quality, lineage, stewardship, privacy, and compliance with relevant regulations (e.g., GDPR, POPIA).
  • Solution Delivery Oversight – Provide architectural guidance throughout the project lifecycle — from proof‑of‑concept to production — ensuring solutions meet non‑functional requirements (performance, reliability, scalability).
  • Risk & Issue Management – Identify technical risks, develop mitigation plans, and proactively address architectural challenges.
  • Thought Leadership – Keep abreast of emerging trends in data architecture, analytics, cloud, and AI, and translate these into actionable innovation opportunities.

Decision ownership:

  • Architectural Direction – Own decisions on the overall design and architectural approach for enterprise data and analytics solutions.
  • Technology Standards – Approve and maintain the organization’s data architecture frameworks, standards, and patterns.
  • Platform & Tooling Selection – Make final recommendations on the adoption of core data platforms, tools, and analytics technologies.
  • Data Integration & Interoperability – Decide on integration patterns, APIs, and data exchange mechanisms to ensure seamless interoperability across systems.
  • Security & Compliance Controls –Implement data security measures and controls to protect sensitive information and ensure compliance.
  • Solution Approval – Ensure approval for solution designs before implementation to ensure alignment with enterprise and security architecture principles.
  • Scalability & Performance Trade‑offs – Weigh cost, time‑to‑market, and long‑term scalability when making architectural choices.

The ideal candidate for this role will have:

 

•    Matric essential
•    Degree or Diploma in Information Systems / BSc Computer Science / BSc engineering (or similar tertiary qualifications)
•    5+ years in data warehousing, ETL integration
•    7+ years’ experience with all aspects of IT projects from business analysis, architectures, system analysis and design through development, testing, implementation, and production support (SDLC).
•    2+ years leading an architectural development process and collaborate with application development teams, architects and other members of the software development team.
•    AWS/GCP Certifications would be advantageous.

 

Core competencies, knowledge and experience:
•    Expert-level proficiency in SQL, including complex query design, performance optimization, data modelling, and integration across cloud platforms and BI tools to support advanced analytics and business decision-making.
•    Able to analyse complex use cases to model and interpret data through critical thinking.
•    Deep subject matter knowledge of data staging, data lakes, data warehousing, data marts and operational data stores, big data, and analytics as applicable to the telecoms business domain is essential.
•    Experience with modern data processing and analytics technologies such as Big Query, Redshift, Teradata, Exadata, Abinitio, Cloudera, etc.
•    Demonstrated expertise in implementing and managing IT controls within an analytics environment, including proficiency in ensuring data integrity, system reliability, and compliance with relevant governance frameworks and risk mitigation practices.
•    Experience working high-volume data and file processing (real-time and batch processing).

Advantageous
•    Big Data knowledge (Hadoop, Map Reduce, Spark, Kafka, etc.)
•    Analytics: Python knowledge
•    Experience architecting and designing cloud & big data solutions 
•    Experience with Analytics production implementations in the Cloud (AWS, GCP)
•    Broad understanding of governance best practices for analytics platforms, data warehousing and business intelligence.
•    Experience with Data Quality/Data Profiling, Metadata Integration, Master Data Management.


We make an impact by offering:

  • Enticing incentive programs and competitive benefit packages
  • Retirement funds, risk benefits, and medical aid benefits
  • Cell phone and data benefits, advantages fibre connection discounts, and exclusive staff discounts offered in collaboration with partner companies


Closing date for Applications: 16 October 2025. 


The base location for this role is Century City

 

The company's approved Employment Equity Plan and Targets will be considered as part of the recruitment process. As an Equal Opportunities employer, we actively encourage and welcome people with various disabilities to apply.
Vodacom is committed to an organisational culture that recognises, appreciates, and values diversity & inclusion.
 

Commitment from Vodacom

Vodacom is committed to attracting, developing and retaining the very best people by offering a flexible, motivating and inclusive workplace in which talent is truly recognized, developed and rewarded. We believe that diversity plays an important role in the success of our business and we are committed to creating an inclusive work environment which respects, values, celebrates and makes the most of people’s individual differences - we are not only multinational but multicultural too. At Vodacom you will have access to our excellent flexible benefits programme that you would expect from any global company.

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