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North Carolina's Electric Cooperatives · 2 months ago

Manager, ML Operations & Data Engineering

Raleigh, North Carolina, United States

Full-time

Onsite

Senior Level

5+ years exp

North Carolina's Electric Cooperatives is an organization that supports the state's local electric cooperatives. The Lead ML & Data Engineering Manager will oversee the full machine learning and data engineering lifecycle, managing a cross-functional data team while ensuring high-quality delivery and adherence to best practices.

Electrical DistributionEnergyRenewable Energy

No H1B

Responsibilities

Lead, mentor, and develop a cross-functional team of ML engineers, data engineers, and analysts

Translate business needs into actionable data and ML initiatives with clear milestones and measurable outcomes

Define and enforce team processes, standards, and best practices for data engineering, model development, and deployment

Manage sprint planning, prioritization, and delivery for ML and data projects

Collaborate closely with the Director of Data Engineering to align technical strategy with enterprise data governance, architecture, and security policies

Champion innovation by staying current with trends in AI, ML, and data infrastructure, identifying opportunities for continuous improvement

Design, develop, and deploy scalable, production-ready machine learning models and data pipelines

Optimize workloads for cost, performance, and reliability within the Databricks Lakehouse ecosystem

Build and maintain feature pipelines, MLflow model registries, and CI/CD workflows for automated training and deployment

Process, transform, and analyze large-scale structured and unstructured datasets

Integrate models into APIs, applications, or downstream systems (e.g., Azure Container Apps, Model Serving Endpoints)

Ensure compliance with data governance, lineage, and security standards

Conduct code reviews, provide technical mentorship, and contribute to architecture design decisions

Qualification

DatabricksMachine LearningData EngineeringMLOpsPythonSQLAzureCI/CDAgileLeadershipCommunication

Required

Bachelor's degree in computer science, Computer Information Systems, Computer Engineering, Math, or related technical degree from an accredited institution, and/or equivalent experience

5–10 years of progressive experience in data, machine learning, or software engineering roles, with a proven track record of delivering production-grade ML and data solutions

At least 3 years of hands-on experience designing, developing, optimizing, and deploying machine learning models in production environments (preferably using Databricks, Azure ML, or similar platforms)

2+ years of leadership experience as a technical lead, team lead, or manager overseeing data engineers, ML engineers, or data scientists — including mentoring, code review, and project delivery oversight

Demonstrated experience integrating ML models into operational systems, APIs, or business workflows

Background in data architecture, pipeline orchestration, and performance optimization across large datasets

Proven ability to collaborate cross-functionally with data platform, analytics, and business teams to translate organizational goals into scalable data and ML solutions

Databricks platform experience required — including Lakehouse architecture, cluster management, Delta tables, and Spark

Proficiency with MLflow, Feature Store, and AutoML workflows

Strong foundation in Python, SQL, and ML frameworks such as scikit-learn, PyTorch, TensorFlow, or XGBoost

Experience with CI/CD, Git-based workflows, and DevOps principles for ML (MLOps)

Proven ability to lead and mentor technical teams while remaining a hands-on contributor

Deep understanding of MLOps best practices: model lifecycle management, observability, and retraining automation

Strong experience in data preparation, feature engineering, and exploratory data analysis

Ability to translate business requirements into scalable technical solutions

Excellent written and verbal communication; able to interface confidently with both technical and non-technical audiences

Demonstrated ability to work independently, manage multiple priorities, and deliver under tight deadlines

Familiarity with Agile and iterative development methodologies

Preferred

Experience within the public utility, energy, or infrastructure sector is highly desirable, particularly with applications such as load forecasting, outage prediction, grid optimization, or asset analytics

Familiarity with LLMs, Vector Search, and Generative AI integration is preferred

Azure (or equivalent cloud platform) experience strongly preferred

Relevant Databricks, Azure, or ML certifications are a plus

Company

North Carolina's Electric Cooperatives

North Carolina’s electric cooperatives are a network of not-for-profit electric utility organizations powering the days and empowering the lives of 2.8 million North Carolinians from the mountains to the coast.

Founded in 1949

Raleigh, North Carolina, USA

51-200 employees