At Academy Sports + Outdoors our vision is to be the best sports + outdoors retailer in the country — but what truly sets us apart is our people. We’re a passionate, purpose-driven team that’s as committed to each other as we are to our customers.
We’ve spent over 80 years building a culture that puts people first. We believe in creating opportunities for growth, fostering meaningful connections, and supporting every Team Member’s journey. What fuels us? Our belief in the power of fun.
Here, you won’t just help customers gear up for their next adventure — you’ll launch one of your own. Whether you're starting out or leveling up, Academy is a place where fun can’t lose!
What You Will Work OnIn this role, you shape the enterprise data platform that teams rely on for secure, scalable, and dependable data integration. Your work strengthens the infrastructure and platform capabilities that move data across the organization, helping Data Products, Analytics Engineering, and business stakeholders access trusted and governed solutions. By improving reliability, performance, security, and operational efficiency, you create a stronger foundation for enterprise data consumption.
Working across cloud-based data ecosystems, you design and maintain platform services, ingestion frameworks, orchestration workflows, and ELT/ETL integration patterns. You lead modernization through automation, CI/CD, infrastructure-as-code, and deployment optimization while advancing monitoring, observability, alerting, lineage, metadata, and operational support. You also establish engineering standards and reusable frameworks, guide technical initiatives, evaluate emerging technologies, and help the team improve platform capabilities and engineering effectiveness.
Who You Will Work WithYou will collaborate with Data Products, Analytics Engineering, and business stakeholders to deliver data solutions that are trusted, governed, and accessible. These partnerships connect platform engineering decisions with the teams and business needs that depend on reliable enterprise data.
Within the Data Platform Engineering team, you will provide technical leadership, mentorship, guidance, and knowledge sharing across development and operational initiatives. You will also influence cross-functional teams by communicating technical concepts clearly to both technical and non-technical stakeholders.
What You BringBring your energy, your ideas, and your love for sports and the outdoors.
Bachelor's degree in Computer Science, Engineering, Information Systems, Data Engineering, or related field required
7+ years of experience in Data Engineering, Platform Engineering, Cloud Engineering, or related disciplines
Experience designing, implementing, and supporting large-scale enterprise data platforms and integration solutions
Experience with cloud platforms, including Google Cloud Platform (GCP)
Experience developing and supporting data orchestration, streaming technologies, CI/CD pipelines, infrastructure automation, and observability solutions
Experience implementing security, governance, metadata management, lineage, and data quality frameworks
Retail or related industry experience preferred
Strong knowledge of enterprise data platform architecture, cloud-native engineering, and data integration patterns
Experience designing and supporting ELT/ETL frameworks, ingestion services, and enterprise data pipelines
Strong proficiency with SQL, Python, BigQuery scripting, or similar technologies
Experience with Google BigQuery, DBT Core, OpenMetadata, Cube Cloud, Composer, Datastage, Confluent Kafka, GoAnywhere, or similar technologies
Experience implementing CI/CD pipelines, infrastructure automation, monitoring, and observability solutions
Strong understanding of security, privacy, governance, disaster recovery, and operational resilience principles
Strong troubleshooting, analytical, and problem-solving skills in distributed and cloud-native environments
Ability to develop reusable frameworks, engineering standards, and best practices
Strong verbal, written, and interpersonal communication skills
Ability to influence cross-functional teams and communicate technical concepts to both technical and non-technical stakeholders
Ability to mentor engineers and provide technical leadership across development and operational initiatives
A team-first attitude; while your core duties are your priority, you're happy to step in wherever you're needed
Flexible work schedule may be required to support business needs
Regular in-office attendance is required
Acceptable level of hearing and vision to perform job duties
Ability to adhere to company policies and professional standards
Automated Processes, Deployments, Best Practices, Collaboration and Teamwork, Security, Mentorship, Technology Solutions
Equal Employment OpportunityAcademy is an Equal Opportunity Employer and does not discriminate with regard to employment opportunities or practices on the basis of race, religion, national origin, sex, age, disability, gender identity, sexual orientation, or any other category protected by law.
Skills Required
- Bachelor's degree in Computer Science, Engineering, Information Systems, Data Engineering, or a related field
- 7+ years of experience in Data Engineering, Platform Engineering, Cloud Engineering, or related disciplines
- Experience designing, implementing, and supporting large-scale enterprise data platforms and integration solutions
- Experience with cloud platforms, including Google Cloud Platform
- Experience developing and supporting data orchestration, streaming technologies, CI/CD pipelines, infrastructure automation, and observability solutions
- Experience implementing security, governance, metadata management, lineage, and data quality frameworks
- Retail or related industry experience
- Strong knowledge of enterprise data platform architecture, cloud-native engineering, and data integration patterns
- Experience designing and supporting ELT/ETL frameworks, ingestion services, and enterprise data pipelines
- Strong proficiency with SQL, Python, BigQuery scripting, or similar technologies
- Experience with Google BigQuery, dbt Core, OpenMetadata, Cube Cloud, Composer, DataStage, Confluent Kafka, GoAnywhere, or similar technologies
- Experience implementing CI/CD pipelines, infrastructure automation, monitoring, and observability solutions
- Strong understanding of security, privacy, governance, disaster recovery, and operational resilience principles
- Strong troubleshooting, analytical, and problem-solving skills in distributed and cloud-native environments
- Ability to develop reusable frameworks, engineering standards, and best practices
- Strong verbal, written, and interpersonal communication skills
- Ability to influence cross-functional teams and communicate technical concepts to technical and non-technical stakeholders
- Ability to mentor engineers and provide technical leadership across development and operational initiatives
- Flexible work schedule may be required to support business needs
- Regular in-office attendance
Academy Sports + Outdoors Compensation & Benefits Highlights
The following summarizes recurring compensation and benefits themes identified from responses generated by popular LLMs to common candidate questions about Academy Sports + Outdoors and has not been reviewed or approved by Academy Sports + Outdoors.
-
Retirement Support — A dollar-for-dollar 401(k) match up to 6% and an employee stock purchase plan are consistently presented as core strengths. These features stand out within big-box retail and are frequently highlighted as valuable parts of total compensation.
-
Wellbeing & Lifestyle Benefits — A 20% merchandise discount, pay-on-demand access to wages, and tuition reimbursement provide tangible everyday value. Onsite gym access in Katy corporate/DC locations and vendor discount networks further enhance lifestyle perks.
-
Leave & Time Off Breadth — Paid time off, paid holidays, and defined maternity and parental leave are part of the standard package. Materials also indicate PTO availability for some part-time store roles in certain situations.
Academy Sports + Outdoors Insights
What We Do
At Academy Sports + Outdoors, we believe in the power of fun. And we believe in helping our customers have more of it. With a wide assortment of sporting and outdoors gear, Academy offers the best brands under one roof — curated to make the most of every budget. Day in and day out, our 20,000+ Team Members bring a sense of adventure, energy, and passion to work. Understanding our people and the things that matter to them has been at the core of Academy culture for over 80 years. We take pride in creating a workplace that values hard work, commitment, growth, and of course, FUN. Academy — headquartered in Katy, TX, a suburb of Houston — is one of the nation’s largest sporting goods and outdoor stores. We offer a broad assortment of quality hunting, fishing, and camping equipment and gear, as well as sports and leisure products, footwear, apparel, and much more. Originally founded in 1938 as a family business in Texas, Academy has grown to a wide network of stores across many states, with $6.8 billion in annual revenue.
