Manager: Data Engineering - Road Accident Fund

The Road Accident Fund is a state insurer established by statute, it provides insurance cover to all drivers of motor vehicles in South Africa in respect of liability incurred or damage caused as a result of a traffic collision. Liability incurred in relation to property damage (such as damage to vehicles, buildings, vehicle contents) is excluded from cover.

Purpose of the Job: 

Reporting to the Senior Manager: Data and Analytics, the successful incumbent is responsible to manage and inspire dynamic data engineering team in designing, building, operationalising, securing, and monitoring data pipelines and data stores to solution designs, standards policies and governance requirements thus making data accessible for the evaluation and optimisation for downstream use case consumption.

Key Performance Areas

Policy review and implementation

• Contribute to the development and implementation of departmental policy, procedures and processes.
• Establish data governance policies for unstructured data to ensure data security, privacy, and compliance.

Designing and securing scalable data pipelines and data stores

• Design and develop data pipelines for structured, semi-structured and unstructured data.
• Design and develop data pipelines for batch, streaming and event-driven data flows.
• Design and develop integration to internal and 3rd party systems.
• Ensure automation and orchestration of data pipelines and integrations.
• Administering the end-to-end management of data engineering projects, from inception through agile delivery.

Data Pipeline Performance

• Implementing a strategic review and optimisation process for existing data pipelines to enhance efficiency and performance.
• Establishing metrics and monitoring systems to continuously assess pipeline health and performance.
• Review of pipeline monitoring reports (latency, success rates).
• Ensure the analysis of data pipeline logs and error messages.
• Leading the exploration and integration of new tools and technologies to improve pipeline scalability and reliability.

Data Quality

• Developing and enforcing data quality standards and processes across all data engineering projects.
• Initiating regular data audits and implementing data cleaning practices to maintain high data integrity.
• Ensure the review of data quality reports and error rates.
• Approval of data validation and cleansing processes.
• Collaborate with a range of stakeholders on data quality expectations.
• Provide oversight of data quality monitoring tools and alerts.
• Evaluation of data lineage and traceability practices.
• Championing a culture of quality-first in data handling and processing.
• Collaborating with the Data Governance function to align data quality initiatives with RAF standards.

Unstructured Data Management

• Developing strategies for the efficient handling and storage of unstructured data, including the use of Enterprise Content Management systems, intranet sites, and web channels.
• Implementing policies and tools for tagging, categorising, and indexing unstructured data to enhance searchability and access.
• Leading initiatives to integrate unstructured data with structured databases and analytics tools.
• Collaborating with T&D and Business Units to ensure unstructured data management solutions meet RAF needs and compliance requirements.
• Evaluation of business needs for unstructured data management.
• Planning for integration of ECM solutions with data pipelines to ingest intranet, web, and other unstructured data.
• Monitoring of the effectiveness of unstructured data management processes for intranet, web, and other data sources.

Technology Adoption

• Leading the evaluation and adoption of cutting-edge data engineering technologies and methodologies.
• Ensuring alignment of technology adoption with RAF’s strategic goals and data strategy.
• Ensuring alignment of technology and adoption with the RAF’s strategic goals and data strategy.
• Advocating for and securing resources for team training on new technologies.
• Establishing partnerships with technology providers and industry groups to stay ahead of technology trends.

Effective Communication

• Conduct needs assessments to understand the target audience, their preferred communication styles, and information gaps.
• Develop clear and concise communication materials tailored to different audiences and channels (e.g., email, presentations, videos).
• Utilise multimedia platforms and interactive tools to enhance engagement and knowledge retention.
• Organise training sessions and workshops to equip employees with the necessary skills to effectively communicate technical information.
• Establish feedback mechanisms (e.g., surveys, focus groups) to gather feedback and continuously improve communication effectiveness.

Reporting

• Ensure preparation and submission of Regulation reports.
• Report quarterly on progress with implementation of operational plans.
• Ensure development of functional reporting systems, project or performance reporting for management.
• Ensure the development of reports/ policies/ procedures and guide the process through the alignment of these documents to the overall RAF’s Strategy.
• Ensure regular and periodic reports are prepared and submitted as and when required to provide progress updates and/or inform management decisions.

Stakeholders

• Facilitating cross-functional collaboration to ensure data pipelines meet the needs of various stakeholders.
• Communicate with all levels of stakeholder contact.
• Ensure clear understanding and alignment with stakeholders in the impact and value of adopted technologies.

People Management

• Ensure the sourcing, development and retention of a high-performance team.
• Manage the recruitment of the operational workforce in line with employment equity targets.
• Manage staff in the department to ensure that they achieve their objectives in line with the strategic objectives of the RAF.
• Manage the implementation of people management processes and procedures to control/regulate workplace conflict and/or institute corrective measures and consultation processes to address deviations from standards.
• Allocate, direct, motivate and evaluate subordinates to help them achieve their individual goals.
• Establishing partnerships with technology providers and industry groups to stay ahead of technology trends.

Qualifications and Experience

• Bachelor’s Degree/Advanced Diploma in Information Technology or a Computer Science or Business Administration or Commerce/Business or Engineering.
• Postgraduate in Information Technology/Computer Science/Business Administration/ Commerce/ Engineering related qualification will be advantageous.
• Professional certification in and Data Platform/Technology framework(s) will be an added advantage.
• Relevant 6-8 years’ experience in IT, or Business Development, or a related field of which 2 years must on management/area of expertise/ supervisory level.
• Experience in developing and building databases, warehouses, reporting and data integration solutions.
• Experience in building and optimising big data pipelines, architectures, and data sets.
• Experience in Cloud -native data.
• Experience in Infrastructure -as-code, CI/CD.

Technical and Behavioral Competencies Required

• Resilience
• Communication
• Working with People
• Network and Alliances
• Planning, Organising and Coordinating
• Employee Engagement
• Personal Mastery
• Judgement and Decision Making
• Ethics and Values
• Client Service Orientation
• Change Management
• Coaching and mentoring
• Conflict Management
• Critical and innovative thinking.
• Direction setting.
• Facilitation and Presentation Skills.
• People management.
• Policy conceptualisation and formulation.
• Risk Management.
• Programme/project management.
• Service Delivery Innovation.
• Stakeholder development and relations.
• Reporting.
• Knowledge of the advanced Analytics Model Deployment and Integration.
• Data API’s.
• Ability to implement solutions in an agile approach.
• Big Data Technologies.
• Cloud Platforms.
• Data Integration Techniques.
• Data Pipelines.
• Data Quality Management.
• Data Warehousing and Business Intelligence.
• Programming Languages.
• Scripting Languages.
• Unstructured Data Management.
• Version Control Systems.