Data Management Lead – Analytics – Retail at Salt South Africa

About the Role

• A leading South African value retailer is restructuring its analytics capability – moving away from flat team structures and long-term contractor reliance toward permanent leaders who take real ownership of their domains. This is one of those critical hires.
• The Data Management Lead owns the data management layer that underpins all analytics across the business. This means establishing and governing robust semantic models and semantic layers, building a multi-year roadmap, and leading a small internal team – while collaborating closely with an external data engineering partner. The role requires someone who thinks in years, not tickets.

Team You’ll Lead

• 1 Data Steward
• 1 Support Analyst
• 3 Analytics Engineers
• Close collaboration with an external Data Engineering Lead and their team of approximately 6 engineers (GCP-focused; Microsoft stack sits with this role)

Key Responsibilities

• Own the design, implementation, and governance of semantic models and semantic layers – Power BI modelling treated as a semantic layer, not just a visualisation tool
• Build and drive a multi-year data management strategy and roadmap – five-year thinking, not just the next sprint
• Lead, coach, and develop the internal analytics team
• Establish clear intake, triage, and prioritisation processes to protect team capacity from ad-hoc demand
• Collaborate with the external engineering team on data availability, quality, and GCP to Microsoft platform integration
• Build and maintain a sustainable, production-ready Microsoft analytics environment
• Challenge and reduce reliance on non-scalable patterns (SharePoint lists as databases, low-code technical debt)
• Act as primary technical and strategic owner of the analytics data management domain

Requirements

• Strong data engineering background with deep expertise in semantic modelling and Power BI – tabular/semantic models, not report-building
• Proven experience leading technical teams with genuine domain ownership
• Demonstrated ability to build long-term roadmaps and deliver sustainable platforms
• Solid grasp of data modelling best practice, performance, and governance within a Microsoft analytics stack
• Effective across both technical teams and business stakeholders

Advantageous

• Retail or large multi-site operational experience
• Hybrid environment experience – Microsoft analytics alongside cloud platforms (GCP)
• Experience bringing structure and accountability to previously flat or contractor-heavy teams

Role Details

• Employment type: Permanent
• Location: Kuils River, Cape Town (on-site)
• Target start: October 2026 / phased into FY27
• Annual package: R1 350 000.00