SAFE Credit Union

POSITION PURPOSE

Develops, manages, and advances SAFE Credit Union’s enterprise data governance and data management capabilities. This role establishes complete governance of SAFE’s data assets through frameworks, policies, processes, metrics, and technologies. This role will also drive adoption of data stewardship practices across all business functions.

The AVP sets the vision and roadmap for data governance and management by aligning to business objectives. They will extensively collaborate with stakeholders to identify needs while assessing and adapting to the current data landscape.  To this end, the AVP plans and executes enhancements to further mature data governance and data management. This includes implementing standards, metrics, and procedures to ensure high quality, compliant and reliable data and business insights.

In addition, the AVP builds, leads, and mentors the Data Governance team and oversees the Data Governance Council and Data Stewardship Council. The AVP’s leadership and influence instills a culture of accountability to govern data as a strategic business asset.

ESSENTIAL FUNCTIONS AND BASIC DUTIES

• Develop and implement data governance standards, policies, procedures, and guidelines.
• Lead the design and rollout of the enterprise data governance framework to the organization.
• Maintain data policies and standards through a sustainable governance process.
• Identify business requirements and data needs through engagement with stakeholders.
• Work cross-functionally to build relationships, consensus, and shared data governance vision across business units.
• Collaborate with IT, Business Intelligence & Reporting (BI&R), Data Engineering, Finance, and other teams on data governance strategy and roadmap.
• Establish and track data quality metrics, key performance indicators, and benchmarks.
• Oversee data remediation, issue resolution, and continuous improvement initiatives.
• Monitor data governance controls and compliance with internal and external regulations.
• Define data stewardship roles and responsibilities across the organization.
• Provide data governance training and support to business users and key stakeholders.

• Act as an escalation point for critical data issues and disputes.
• Present governance progress, risks, issues, and initiatives to executive leadership.
• Stay current on data governance best practices and emerging technologies.
• Evangelize the value of data governance across the enterprise.
• Manage the data governance program budget, vendors, resources, and tooling; participate in the annual budgeting and forecasting process and tracking actual expenses to budget.
• Lead the data governance team, providing mentoring, coaching, and career development.
• Provide coaching and mentoring to build the capabilities of data stewards.
• Chair the Data Governance Council, facilitating decision-making and alignment.
• Guide and enable the Data Steward Council to enforce data policies and standards.
• Promote participation and engagement in data governance at all levels.
• Recognize and reward data governance contributions and achievements.
• Perform other duties as assigned.

QUALIFICATIONS

Education/Certification:

Bachelor’s degree in business or IT-related discipline from a four-year college or equivalent experience.

Experience Required:

To perform this job successfully, an individual must be able to perform each essential duty satisfactorily. The requirements listed below are representative of the knowledge, skill, and/or ability required. Reasonable accommodations may be made to enable individuals with disabilities to perform the essential functions.

• 5+ years’ experience managing enterprise data governance programs.
• 5+ years of people management experience
• Experience developing data quality standards and metrics.
• Background in data security, privacy, and compliance.
• Financial services industry experience a plus.

Required Knowledge:

The AVP of Data Governance should have broad knowledge spanning data, technology, business acumen, and leadership skills to effectively develop, implement, and manage data governance for the organization including:

• In-depth understanding of data governance concepts, frameworks, and best practices.
• Knowledge of data management technologies and disciplines like data quality, metadata repositories, data catalogs, data modeling, master data management.
• Understanding of data architecture principles and how systems store, process, and share data.
• Knowledge of data governance frameworks, policies, standards, and best practices.
• Familiarity with data governance technologies and tools for managing governance programs.
• Knowledge of industry data standards and schemas.
• Understanding of organizational change management principles and techniques.
• Knowledge of strategic planning and roadmap development.
• Understanding of data analytics and business intelligence capabilities and how governance enhances them.
• Knowledge of statistical analysis and techniques for measuring data quality.
• Understanding of IT systems development life cycle and project management methodologies.
• Knowledge of emerging trends and innovations in data governance and data management.
• Understanding of various organizational functions and subject matter areas to properly govern enterprise data assets.
• Knowledge of financial management principles for managing program budget and resources.

Skills/Abilities:

• Exceptional leadership skills, with a track record of leading high-performing business-centric teams.
• Demonstrated ability to coach/mentor business-centric technical team members and foster their development.
• Strong business acumen paired with solid technical capabilities.
• Strategic mindset, with ability to align initiatives to business goals.
• Strong leadership presence, ability to influence and drive change across various levels in the organization.
• Ability to translate business needs into an enterprise data governance strategy and roadmap.
• Ability to execute and operationalize a data governance framework.
• Ability to successfully manage and prioritize competing demands in a fast-paced environment.
• Ability to work with all levels within an organization.
• Superior problem-solving, data, presentation, and analytical skills.

LANGUAGE SKILLS:

• Excellent communication skills (verbal, written, listening skills, and empathy).
• Expert ability to build relationships with other leaders, business partners, and stakeholders.

MATHEMATICAL SKILLS AND REASONING ABILITY:

• Ability to interpret a variety of instructions furnished in written, oral, or schedule form.
• Ability to solve practical problems and deal with a variety of concrete variables in situations where only limited standardization exists.

WORK ENVIRONMENT/PHYSICAL DEMANDS SUMMARY

PHYSICAL DEMANDS AND WORK ENVIRONMENT

The physical demands described here are representative of those that must be met by an employee to successfully perform the essential functions of this job. 

• While performing the duties of this job, the employee is regularly required to sit and talk or hear, and use hands to finger, handle, or feel objects, tools, or controls.
• The employee is occasionally required to stand; walk; reach with hands and arms; and stoop, kneel, crouch, or crawl.
• The employee must occasionally lift and/or move up to 10 pounds.
• Specific vision abilities required by this job include close vision.
• The noise level in the work environment is usually moderate.

INTENT AND FUNCTION OF JOB DESCRIPTIONS

This is not necessarily an all-inclusive list of job-related responsibilities, duties, skills, efforts, requirements or working conditions.  All descriptions have been reviewed to ensure that only essential functions and basic duties have been included.  Peripheral tasks, only incidentally related to each position, have been excluded.  Requirements, skills, and abilities included have been determined to be the minimal standards required to successfully perform the positions.  While this is intended to be an accurate reflection of the current job, management reserves the right to revise the job or to require that other or different tasks be performed as assigned.

In accordance with the Americans with Disabilities Act, it is possible that requirements may be modified to reasonably accommodate disabled individuals.  However, no accommodations will be made which may pose serious health or safety risks to the employee or others or which impose undue hardships on the organization.

Job descriptions are not intended as and do not create employment contracts.  The organization maintains its status as an at-will employer.  Employees can be terminated for any reason not prohibited by law.