Head - Data Engineer at City of Cape Town

Requirements

• A relevant tertiary qualification (honours or 4-year degree), preferably in Computer Science, Engineering or a related technical field
• At least 8 years’ relevant experience
• Solid hands-on experience working with open-source technologies and software across the data engineering lifecycle
• Deep technical grounding in modern data engineering (infrastructure-as-code, containerisation, observability, APIs) paired with proven leadership
• Strong communication skills and the ability to tailor your message to technical, operational and executive audiences

Key Performance Areas

• Lead the architecture and delivery of scalable, reliable, cost- effective data platforms (ingestion, transformation, storage and serving) across cloud and on-premise environments
• Drive the development, deployment and monitoring of data products and APIs that answer the City's most important questions
• Establish governance, standards and best practice for the City's data analytics and AI community, including the City Data Product Catalogue
• Lead, mentor and grow a team of data engineers, DevOps and front-end specialists
• Own people, financial, project, risk and change management for the section
• Engage senior stakeholders, up to City Manager, Executive Management and Mayoral Committee level, to translate business needs into data solutions

CLOSING DATE 19.10.2026