We’re building a world of health around every individual — shaping a more connected, convenient and compassionate health experience. At CVS Health®, you’ll be surrounded by passionate colleagues who care deeply, innovate with purpose, hold ourselves accountable and prioritize safety and quality in everything we do. Join us and be part of something bigger – helping to simplify health care one person, one family and one community at a time.
Position SummaryThe Principal Data Architect is the senior individual contributor accountable for data architecture across Aetna Technology. This role sets the technical direction for how data is modeled, stored, moved, governed, and consumed across a multivendor data estate spanning multiple clouds. The Principal Data Architect defines the data reference architectures and strategy that domain teams build on, establishes where the singular systems of record live, and serves as Aetna Technology's deepest technical authority on data — driving outcomes through design authority and influence rather than direct reports.
This role can work remotely from anywhere in the continental USA.
Key Responsibilities:Data Architecture and Reference Design- Own the Aetna Technology data reference architectures — ingestion, storage, transformation, semantic, and consumption layers — across a multivendor, multicloud data estate.
- Define the data mesh operating model: domain-owned data products with clear contracts, and the platform capabilities that make domain ownership viable rather than fragmenting.
- Carve out and protect the singular systems of record — establishing which domain owns which authoritative dataset and how others consume it.
- Design and maintain the golden paths for pipelines and data products — patterns for ingestion, modeling, and publishing that let teams ship without re-solving solved problems.
- Embed data governance, lineage, and quality as automated gates in the pipeline, not as a downstream review.
- Define controls for regulated and sensitive data (including PHI) — classification, access, masking, and retention inherited by default across the portfolio.
- Establish zero-trust patterns for data access — identity, least privilege, and blast-radius reduction for authoritative datasets.
- Provide the data architecture underpinning Aetna Technology AI capabilities — feature readiness, retrieval, and the data contracts that AI and agentic systems depend on.
- Establish the semantic and metrics layer that lets analytics and dashboards scale reliably to people-managers and business users across Aetna.
- Partner with AI and analytics platform teams on the data infrastructure required to serve workloads securely and cost-effectively at scale.
- Author the data standards enforced as automated gates and golden-path defaults, not as a review queue.
- Contribute to architecture governance — reference architectures, technology radar input, and design reviews — in partnership with Enterprise Architecture.
- Evaluate emerging data platform and tooling options and make directional recommendations on adoption.
- Translate data architecture trade-offs into clear, decision-oriented narratives for senior technology leaders and peer architects.
- Coach and raise the bar for Solution Architects and senior engineers through design reviews and system-level reasoning — without direct reporting relationships.
- Act as a credible technical partner to strategic data platform vendors and internal platform teams.
- 12+ years in technology, with deep, hands-on data architecture experience at Aetna Technology scale.
- Expert-level data platform architecture across multivendor, multicloud environments (e.g., Snowflake, GCP/BigQuery, AWS); fluent across modeling, pipelines, and consumption layers.
- Demonstrated ownership of enterprise data architectures and golden-path patterns for data products.
- Strong command of data governance, lineage, quality, and regulated-data controls (PHI or equivalent).
- Working knowledge of data mesh, domain ownership, and systems-of-record design.
- Track record of driving technical outcomes through influence and design authority as an individual contributor.
- Experience in healthcare, health insurance, or similarly regulated industries.
- Hands-on background with the data infrastructure behind AI/ML — feature stores, retrieval, and data contracts for model and agent workloads.
- Familiarity with FinOps and cost-aware data architecture, able to tie design decisions to dollar impact.
- Experience with infrastructure-as-code and automated policy/guardrail enforcement.
- Technical Depth — Aetna Technology's deepest data authority; credible with Principal Engineers and able to go deep on any layer of the data stack.
- Systems Thinking — Sees the whole system; anticipates second-order effects across governance, cost, and downstream consumption.
- Decisiveness — Makes directional calls with incomplete information and adjusts as context evolves.
- Influence Without Authority — Drives alignment and raises engineering standards across boundaries with no direct reports.
- Pragmatism — Ships standards as gates and golden paths, not as queues; balances rigor against delivery speed.
Bachelor's degree in Computer Science, Engineering, or a related field or equivalent experience.
Pay Range
The typical pay range for this role is:
$144,200.00 - $288,400.00
This pay range represents the base hourly rate or base annual full-time salary for all positions in the job grade within which this position falls. The actual base salary offer will depend on a variety of factors including experience, education, geography and other relevant factors. This position is eligible for a CVS Health bonus, commission or short-term incentive program in addition to the base pay range listed above. This position also includes an award target in the company’s equity award program.
Our people fuel our future. Our teams reflect the customers, patients, members and communities we serve and we are committed to fostering a workplace where every colleague feels valued and that they belong.
Great benefits for great people
We take pride in offering a comprehensive and competitive mix of pay and benefits that reflects our commitment to our colleagues and their families.
Additional details about available benefits are provided during the application process and on Benefits Moments.
Qualified applicants with arrest or conviction records will be considered for employment in accordance with all federal, state and local laws.
Skills Required
- 12 or more years of technology experience with deep, hands-on data architecture experience at enterprise scale
- Expert-level data platform architecture across multivendor, multicloud environments, including Snowflake, GCP or BigQuery, and AWS
- Demonstrated ownership of enterprise data architectures and golden-path patterns for data products
- Strong command of data governance, lineage, data quality, and regulated-data controls such as PHI
- Working knowledge of data mesh, domain ownership, and systems-of-record design
- Track record of driving technical outcomes through influence and design authority as an individual contributor
- Bachelor’s degree in Computer Science, Engineering, or a related field, or equivalent experience
- Experience in healthcare, health insurance, or similarly regulated industries
- Hands-on experience with AI or ML data infrastructure, including feature stores, retrieval, and data contracts
- Familiarity with FinOps and cost-aware data architecture
- Experience with infrastructure-as-code and automated policy or guardrail enforcement
CVS Health Compensation & Benefits Highlights
The following summarizes recurring compensation and benefits themes identified from responses generated by popular LLMs to common candidate questions about CVS Health and has not been reviewed or approved by CVS Health.
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Healthcare Strength — Health coverage includes medical, dental, and vision with HSA-eligible options, free preventive care, virtual care, and access to MinuteClinic services. Mental-health resources such as counseling support are emphasized, and coverage is often considered solid for full-time colleagues.
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Retirement Support — A dollar-for-dollar 401(k) match up to 5% after one year and an Employee Stock Purchase Plan are consistently highlighted in Total Rewards materials. Feedback suggests retirement programs are a meaningful strength within the overall package.
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Wellbeing & Lifestyle Benefits — Wellbeing offerings include up to 20 no-cost counseling sessions per issue, backup care, tuition assistance, and substantial in-store discounts, alongside broader wellness tools. These everyday perks expand value beyond base pay and can be especially meaningful for full-time schedules.
CVS Health Insights
What We Do
CVS Health is the leading health solutions company that delivers care in ways no one else can. We reach people in more ways and improve the health of communities across America through our local presence, digital channels and our nearly 300,000 dedicated colleagues – including more than 40,000 physicians, pharmacists, nurses and nurse practitioners. Wherever and whenever people need us, we help them with their health – whether that’s managing chronic diseases, staying compliant with their medications, or accessing affordable health and wellness services in the most convenient ways. We help people navigate the health care system – and their personal health care – by improving access, lowering costs and being a trusted partner for every meaningful moment of health. And we do it all with heart, each and every day.
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