Specialist Support Engineer: DataOps at Absa Group Limited (Absa)

Job Description

Team Context 

• Data Engineering is responsible for the central data platform that receives and distributes data across the bank. This is a multi-platform environment and leverages a blend of custom, commercial and open-source tools to manage and support thousands of critical data-related jobs. These jobs are supported and updated in line with changes across the landscape to avoid disruption to downstream data consumers. 

Responsibilities  

• Manage an assigned team through day-to-day support tasks
• Oversee development plans for the team and provide mentorship to the team 
• Provide guidance and peer review
• Support pipelines end to end
• Build and deploy enhancements and new developments or new data pipelines
• Identify and drive optimisation opportunities across the environment
• Manage the handover of new applications ensuring that required standards and practices are met
• Improvement on recovery time in case of prod failures
• Test prototypes and oversee handover to the Data Operations teams
• Attend and contribute to regular team and User meetings
• Responsible for the actual coding or programming of Hadoop applications
• High-speed querying  

Job Experience & Skills Required:  

• 3+ years’ experience working in Big data environment, optimising and building big data pipelines, architectures and data sets with e.g. Java, Scala, Python, Hadoop, Apache Spark and Kafka  
• Minimum one year experience with Scala programming language 
• Minimum one year experience managing a team 
• Cross domain knowledge  
• Familiarity with Hadoop ecosystem and its components  
• Good knowledge of the concepts of Hadoop  
• Solid experience in a working environment in Big Data development utilising SQL or Python  
• Experience in Big Data development using Spark  
• Experience in Hadoop, HDFS and MapReduce  
• Experience in database design, development and data modelling  

The following additional knowledge, skills and attributes are preferred:  

• Good knowledge in back-end programming, specifically java
• Experience with development in a Linux environment and its basic commands
• Understanding of Cloud technologies and migration techniques
• Understanding of data streaming and the intersection of batch and real time data
• Ability to write reliable, manageable, and high-performance code
• Should have basic knowledge of SQL, database structures, principles, and theories 
• Knowledge of workflow/schedulers
• Strong collaboration and communication skills
• Strong analytical and problem-solving skills 
• Experience in Quality Assurance
• Experience in Stakeholder Management
• Experience in Testing

Education

• Bachelor's Degree: Information Technology

End Date: January 21, 2026