Senior Manager, Data Governance

Department

Data & Analytics

Who You Are

You are a data leader who understands that trustworthy analytics doesn’t happen by accident — it has to be built, maintained, and governed. You think in programs, not tickets. You’re energized by the challenge of setting standards that actually stick, and you know that getting adoption requires credibility, relationship-building, and a genuine understanding of what teams need from their data.

You’re as comfortable writing SQL and reviewing dbt models as you are facilitating a stakeholder alignment meeting or coaching an IC through ambiguity. You see AI tooling not as a novelty but as a practical lever for scaling work that would otherwise be prohibitively manual, and you’re already using it that way.

We are seeking a highly skilled and motivated Senior Manager, Data Governance to lead Justworks’ nascent Data Governance team. This is a player-coach role: you will manage a growing team of ICs while owning the programs, standards, and cross-functional relationships that make self-serve analytics at Justworks actually work. Your team’s mandate is to set and enforce the conditions under which analytics assets are defined, certified, documented, and trusted before they reach the business. This work is initiative-driven rather than request-response, and it requires someone who can prioritize without a defined ticket queue, build standards that engineers and analysts will adopt, and make the case for governance to stakeholders who may not have asked for it yet.

Your Success Profile

What You Will Work On

• Lead and develop the Data Governance team — currently two ICs (a Senior Analytics Engineer and a Data Governance Analyst), with further growth anticipated this year — through clear priorities, coaching, and recognition.
• Own the foundational governance buildout: metadata standards and taxonomy, business domain framework, glossary migration and enrichment, data profiling governance, and model conformance for silver- and gold-layer assets.
• Run the ongoing governance programs: asset certification and re-certification, data quality observability, glossary and metrics-catalog freshness, standards enforcement and audit, new asset intake and review, and stakeholder education and adoption.
• Own the data catalog (Atlan) — ensuring the continued accuracy, completeness, and hygiene of asset metadata, glossary terms, and data products; and driving adoption of Atlan as the primary way stakeholders engage with certified data across Justworks.
• Set and enforce certification standards: Governance holds the right to withhold or revoke certification on assets that fail to meet the standard. You’ll exercise that authority credibly and collaboratively.
• Serve as a key subject matter expert for Data & Analytics and cross-functional stakeholders: arbitrate metric and definition differences, and drive company-wide adoption of best practices.
• Drive an AI-native way of working and thinking: accelerate our data governance maturity by leveraging AI for unifying information, enriching metadata, automating governance work and more.
• Contribute to the data governance strategy and roadmap in partnership with Data & Analytics leadership.

How You Will Do Your Work

In the Manager, Data Governance role,  how  results are achieved is paramount for your success and ultimately results in our success as an organization. Your foundational knowledge, skills, abilities, and personal attributes are anchored in the following competencies:

• Plans & Aligns — Translates governance strategy into a prioritized, executable roadmap; communicates clearly about progress, tradeoffs, and urgency; ensures the team’s work is always connected to measurable business outcomes.
• Balances Stakeholders — Understands that governance works by earning trust, not mandating compliance. Develops standards in partnership with affected teams, acts fairly under conflicting demands, and maintains relationships even when decisions are hard.
• Influence and Leadership — Builds credibility with engineers, analysts, and business stakeholders alike. Fosters a culture of knowledge-sharing, continuous improvement, and proactive thinking about data trust across the organization.
• Manages Complexity — Navigates a work environment that blends technical depth, program ownership, and cross-functional coordination. Turns ambiguous mandates into concrete, actionable programs.
• Displays good Judgment — Knows when to enforce a standard and when to build consensus first. Asks questions before acting, applies critical thinking, and takes ownership of outcomes.
• Teamwork & Communication — Bridges technical and non-technical audiences. Translates governance concepts into business value, and business requirements into engineering standards.
• Skills and Knowledge — Maintains hands-on fluency in the technical stack (SQL, dbt, dimensional modeling) and actively develops expertise in evolving areas: AI tooling, data observability, and governance tooling.

In addition, all Justworkers focus on aligning their behaviors to our core values known as COGIS. It stands for:

• Camaraderie — Day to day you can be seen working together toward a higher purpose. You like to have fun. You’re an active listener, treat people respectfully, and have a strong desire to know and help others.
• Openness — Your default is to be open. You’re willing to share information, understand other perspectives, and consider new possibilities. You’re curious, ask open questions, and are receptive to thoughts and feedback from others.
• Grit — You demonstrate grit by having the courage to commit and persevere. You’re committed, earnest, and dive in to get the job done well with a positive attitude.
• Integrity — Simply put, do what you say and say what you’ll do. You’re honest and forthright, have a strong moral compass, and strive to match your words with your actions while leading by example.
• Simplicity — Be like Einstein: “Everything should be made as simple as possible, but no simpler.”

Qualifications

• 8+ years of experience in a data role such as analytics engineering, data engineering, or data governance, with hands-on experience in SQL and dbt.
• 3+ years in people management, with a demonstrated track record of developing ICs and managing team delivery.
• Experience owning data governance, data quality, or data standards programs — not just contributing to them.
• Strong proficiency in SQL; working experience with dbt and dimensional modeling sufficient to define standards and review model conformance.
• Demonstrated experience with managing data catalogs or data governance tooling (Atlan, Alation, Collibra, or similar).
• Hands-on fluency with AI tooling as a productivity and automation lever; ability to apply it within the context of metadata management, documentation, and governance workflows.
• Excellent written and verbal communication skills; ability to drive alignment across technical and non-technical stakeholders.
• Strong program ownership mindset: comfortable prioritizing proactively, operating without a defined ticket queue, and driving initiatives that span teams and timelines.
• Experience working in a startup or high-growth environment where programs had to be built from scratch is preferred.

The base wage range for this position based in our New York City Office is targeted at $166,000.00 - $214,000.00 per year.

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