Director, MDM Integrations (Chicago)

Fitch Group is currently seeking a Director, MDM Integrations based out of our Chicago office.

As a leading, global financial information services provider, Fitch Group delivers vital credit and risk insights, robust data, and dynamic tools to champion more efficient, transparent financial markets. With over 100 years of experience and colleagues in over 30 countries, Fitch Group’s culture of credibility, independence, and transparency is embedded throughout its structure, which includes Fitch Ratings, one of the world’s top three credit ratings agencies, and Fitch Solutions, a leading provider of insights, data and analytics. With dual headquarters in London and New York, Fitch Group is owned by Hearst.

Fitch's Technology & Data Team is a dynamic department where innovation meets impact. Our team includes the Chief Data Office, Chief Software Office, Chief Technology Office, Emerging Technology, Shared Technology Services, Technology, Risk and the Executive Program Management Office (EPMO). Driven by our investment in cutting-edge technologies like AI and cloud solutions, we’re home to a diverse range of roles and backgrounds united by a shared passion for leveraging modern technology to drive projects that matter to our organization and clients. We are also proud to be recognized by Built In as a “Best Place to Work in Technology” 3 years in a row. Whether you're an experienced professional or just starting your career, we offer an exciting and supportive environment where you can grow, innovate, and make a difference.

Want to learn more about a career in technology and data at Fitch?

Visit: https://careers.fitch.group/content/Technology-and-Data/

About the Team

The Master Data Management team is at the forefront of modernizing how Fitch manages its strategic data by establishing enterprise master data for legal entities, securities, and reference data. As part of this team, the candidate will play a key role in shaping a unified, scalable data foundation that supports critical business operations and decision-making.

How You’ll Make an Impact:

• Partner closely with the CDO team to deliver a modern, scalable solution of managing and delivering master and reference data, to consumers - unlocking Fitch’s data for innovation, AI and smarter decision-making.

• As lead of MDM integrations, build hands-on designs & deliver solutions ensuring well-coordinated technical delivery aligned to product-defined priorities and business outcomes
• Integrate agentic and generative AI into Master Data Management to enhance data stewardship, automate matching and enrichment, enable conversational data discovery and issue resolution, and boost user adoption - advancing Fitch’s AI-ready MDM capabilities.
• Optimize MDM integrations performance and high-throughput data access by leveraging appropriate data management methodologies.
• Drive complex data transformations and proactively triage issues to eliminate defects and prevent production incidents.

• Mentor and motivate the squad members to grow their career and assist in technical hiring

You May be a Good Fit if:

• 5-7+ years leading data engineering teams, preferably in financial services and cloud experience (AWS, Azure) and leveraging Agile methodologies, including hands-on expertise with:
• Deep AWS expertise (EKS, Lambda, Glue, Redshift, S3, RDS/Aurora, Valkey/Reddis, Step Functions, MSK/Kafka, Event Bridge)
• Ability to provide technical guidance and leadership to the team
• Applying AI/ML to boost engineering productivity (e.g., GitHub Copilot, Amazon Q)
• Strong Python for data engineering (Pandas, Spark/PySpark) and API Development (FastAPI or similar)
• Design and build high-performance REST/GraphQL APIs with optimized query patterns, pagination, caching, and schema design to ensure low-latency, performant reads at scale
• Build ETL/ELT pipelines for batch and streaming; Kafka/MSK with schemas (Avro/JSON) and delivery semantics
• Open table formats (Iceberg or Delta Lake), partitioning, compaction, ACID, schema evolution
• Database expertise with Postgres for schema design and performance tuning; Redshift optimization (sort/dist keys, WLM)
• Caching with Valkey/Redis: TTL strategies, invalidation, key design
• CI/CD and IaC with GitHub, Git/GitHub workflows, ArgoCD
• Security and reliability: IAM, KMS, secrets, VPC networking, observability (OpenTelemetry), SLOs, cost governance
• Strong system design, testing culture (unit/integration/contract), documentation, threat modeling
• Product-led delivery; ability to translate technical concepts to business outcomes; excellent communication

• Technology solutions and tools including data governance and catalog solutions (e.g. Collibra, Alation, data platform and lake(house) (i.e. ‘medallion’ architecture), and data mesh and virtualization tools (e.g. Starburst, Denodo)
• Experience operating in a product-led environment, where technical solutions are delivered in partnership with product managers, and success is measured by business impact

• Strong track record of evaluating and implementing new technologies and methodologies to enhance efficiency

What Would Make You Stand Out:

• Hands-on experience building AI agents (e.g., using LangChain or LlamaIndex), implementing RAG over enterprise data, and enforcing robust guardrails through rigorous testing and evaluation.
• Applying AI/ML to boost engineering productivity (e.g., GitHub Copilot, Amazon Q) and using agentic AI to automate workflows such as code reviews, test generation, data quality checks, and runbook execution.
• Experience working with AI connection protocols (e.g., MCP, A2A) that ensure secure, interoperable, observable, and vendor-agnostic communication with authenticated, auditable messaging and robust error handling
• Experience with forming strong partnerships with stakeholders and product teams
• Great interpersonal and collaboration skills
• Ability to translate technical concepts to non-technical stakeholders.
• Proven ability to drive innovation and install a culture of ‘continuous improvement’ that measurably improve business outcomes
• Ability to communicate effectively with senior management and influence decision-making and roadmaps

Why Choose Fitch:

• Work-life Balance First: 40% in-office monthly to stay connected while keeping flexibility.
• A Culture of Learning & Mobility: Dedicated trainings, leadership development and mentorship programs designed to ensure that your time at Fitch will be a continuous learning opportunity
• Investing in Your Future: Retirement planning and tuition reimbursement programs that empower you to achieve your short and long-term goals
• Promoting Health & Wellbeing: Comprehensive healthcare offerings that enable physical, mental, financial, social, and occupational wellbeing
• Supportive Parenting Policies: Family-friendly policies, including a generous global parental leave plan, designed to help you balance career and family life effectively
• Inclusive Work Environment: A collaborative workplace where all voices are valued, with Employee Resource Groups that unite and empower our colleagues around the globe
• Dedication to Giving Back: Paid volunteer days, matched funding for donations and ample opportunities to volunteer in your community

Fitch is committed to providing global securities markets with objective, timely, independent and forward-looking credit opinions. To protect Fitch’s credibility and reputation, our employees must take every precaution to avoid conflicts of interest or any appearance of a conflict of interest.Should you be successful in the recruitment process at Fitch Ratings you will be asked to declare any securities holdings and other potential conflicts prior to commencing employment. If you, or your immediate family, have any holdings that may conflict with your work responsibilities, you may be asked to divest yourself of them before beginning work.

Fitch is proud to be an Equal Opportunity and Affirmative Action Employer. We evaluate qualified applicants without regard to race, color, national origin, religion, sex, sexual orientation, gender identity, disability, protected veteran status, and other statuses protected by law.

FOR CHICAGO ROLES ONLY: Expected base pay rates for the role will be between $160,000 and $175,000 per year. Actual salaries will be determined on an individualized basis and may vary based on factors including but not limited to education, training, experience, past performance, and other job-related factors. Base pay is one part of Fitch’s total compensation package, which, depending on the position, may also include commission earnings, discretionary bonuses, long-term incentives, and other benefits sponsored by Fitch.