Data Architect

Overview

AMERICAN SYSTEMS is an employee-owned federal government contractor supporting national priority programs through our strategic solutions in the areas of Information Technology, Test & Evaluation, Engineering & Analysis, and Training.

The Data Architect will provide enterprise-level data architecture, governance, and integration support to the Naval Criminal Investigative Service (NCIS) Digital Business Directorate (DBD). This role is critical to enabling NCIS’s law enforcement, counterterrorism, and counterintelligence missions by designing, implementing, and maintaining secure, scalable, and interoperable data architectures across classified and unclassified environments. 

The Data Architect will support NCIS’s transition from on‑premises systems to a Department of the Navy–approved virtual private cloud environment hosted on Flank Speed Microsoft Azure, while ensuring compliance with Department of War (DoW).

Responsibilities

As a Data Architect with AMERICAN SYSTEMS, you will have the opportunity to do the following:

• Design, implement, and maintain enterprise data architectures that support NCIS investigative, intelligence, and operational missions. 

• Develop and manage conceptual, logical, and physical data models to support structured, semi-structured, and unstructured data. 

• Establish and enforce data standards, naming conventions, and interoperability frameworks, including NIEM Open. 

• Architect cloud-native and hybrid data solutions supporting on‑premises and DON virtual private cloud environments. 

• Implement and maintain data governance frameworks, including data stewardship, metadata management, and data quality controls. 

• Ensure compliance with CJIS, NIST, FISMA, FedRAMP, Privacy Act, CUI, and DoD/DON data policies. 

• Design secure data access controls using least privilege principles, encryption, masking, and data loss prevention mechanisms. 

• Support data integration strategies, including data lakes, data warehouses, federation, and real-time data exchange solutions. 

• Maintain an enterprise data catalog to improve data discoverability, transparency, 

• and governance. 

• Collaborate with data engineering and analytics teams to ensure architectures support machine learning, analytics, and reporting. 

• Optimize data platform performance through indexing, partitioning, query optimization, and scalable cloud architectures. 

• Develop and maintain architecture artifacts, diagrams, and technical documentation. 

• Support enterprise architecture initiatives and provide technical recommendations to government leadership. Department of the Navy (DON), Intelligence Community (IC), and Department of Justice (DoJ) data standards and security requirements. 

• This position operates within secure facilities, including Sensitive Compartmented 

• Information Facilities (SCIFs), and requires close collaboration with government stakeholders, data engineers, data scientists, cybersecurity personnel, and enterprise architects. 

Qualifications

• Active Top Secret (TS) clearance Eligible for Sensitive Compartmented Information (SCI) access 
• Ability to obtain SCI adjudication within six (6) months 

Experience 

• Minimum 10 years of experience in data architecture, data management, or enterprise data engineering 
• Proven experience designing enterprise-scale data architectures in regulated or classified environments 
• Experience supporting law enforcement, intelligence, or DoW organizations is highly preferred 
• Hands-on experience with hybrid cloud and cloud-native architectures, multiple operating systems and containerization techniques, preferably in Microsoft Azure 
• Experience integrating data across multiple systems, agencies, and security domains Technical Skills 
• Data modeling (conceptual, logical, physical) 
• Enterprise data architecture frameworks 
• Data lakes, data warehouses, and hybrid data platforms 
• Metadata management and data catalog solutions 
• Data integration and federation strategies 
• SQL and NoSQL database technologies 
• Performance optimization techniques
• Data security, encryption, masking, and access controls
• Familiarity with NIEM, CJIS, NIST, and DoW data standards

Preferred Qualifications

• Experience with AWS and Microsoft Azure data services
• Familiarity with DoW and DON data strategies
• Experience supporting machine learning and analytics platforms
• Knowledge of Zero Trust data access principles
• Experience developing data governance policies and enterprise data standards
• Strong documentation, briefing, and stakeholder communication skills

Pay Transparency StatementAMERICAN SYSTEMS is committed to pay transparency for our applicants and employee-owners. The salary range for this position is USD $133,000.00/Yr. - USD $222,100.00/Yr. Actual compensation will be determined based on several factors permitted by law. AMERICAN SYSTEMS provides for the welfare of its employees and their dependents through a comprehensive benefits program by offering healthcare benefits, paid leave, retirement plans, insurance programs, and education and training assistance. EEO StatementEEO Race/Sex/Disability Status/Veteran Status