Data Governance Lead - Semantic Layer (PH)

People Insights Data Strategy and Platforms - Data Quality & Governance – Semantic Layer

The mission of The Walt Disney Company is to entertain, inform and inspire people around the globe through the power of unparalleled storytelling, and we can only achieve that through improving the success of the outstanding Employees and Cast Members that make up The Walt Disney Company.

People Insights is a Center of Excellence (CoE) that enables TWDC Human Resource leadership to attract, engage, and retain talent through compelling and actionable People Analytics. We integrate and transform organizational, HR, and Talent Acquisition data into a unified BI portfolio that empowers clients to create compelling stories about our most valuable resource: people.

The Data Quality & Governance team develops and maintains tools and processes which support data management, access & environment management, policy compliance, data stewardship, and delivery of accurate data.  The team works with partners from across HR to ensure data requirements are clear, well documented, translated into technical requirements, validated for accuracy & business usability, and effectively communicated back to collaborators throughout the implementation process.  Additionally, the team has critical partnerships with Legal, Privacy, Information Systems, and Data Engineering to ensure the storage, handling, and usage of data is compliant with company standards and global laws. 

Job Summary

As a Data Governance Lead – Semantic Layer you will bring your natural passion for working with and delivering data solutions to a team that enables data-driven HR strategy for the Walt Disney Company. In this role, you will primarily support governance around semantic layers, security models, and metadata classification including tagging to enable scalable, automated, and AI-ready data solutions. Your expertise will be instrumental in establishing a clear, well-documented, and governed semantic layer that drives data-driven decision-making and unlocks the full potential of enterprise HR data. This role requires experience implementing data governance initiatives, deep understanding of enterprise data architecture, strong communication, and ability to translate complex requirements into agile, business-friendly solutions that enable data security and usability.

This role is a Project Hire/Internal Assignment that will last up to 24 months.

Key responsibilities for this role include:

• Close collaboration with data engineers, product engineers, data scientists and business stakeholders to define a unified semantic framework that not only empowers self-service analytics and ensures data consistency, but also fundamentally transforms our data into an AI-ready knowledge base capable of supporting prompt engineering and complex reasoning
• Partner with legal, privacy, and information security teams to ensure that data governance standards and processes represent and support related compliance policies and practices including access controls, data masking, and encryption
• Creation and management of data classification and tagging process for semantic layers in partnership with Products team to ensure consistent, reuseable, and business-focused data definitions across enterprise HR platforms to support discoverability, lineage tracking, and AI enablement
• Documentation for semantic layer including key business metrics, ontological definitions, relationships, and usage guidelines ensuring clarity, consistency, and ease of understanding for all users
• Implement efficient and accurate control structures and audit process to monitor policy compliance across environments and users
• Communicate complex technical data cross-functionally with business partners, Analytics and Data Engineering teams to gather source system information, requirements for data integrations, providing impact analysis, and context using business language empowering teams to make data-driven decisions
• Design and deploy scalable security models to protect HR information assets across complex, interdependent data systems

Basic Qualifications

• Bachelor’s degree in Computer Science, MIS, Engineering, Analytics or related field or 8+ years equivalent work experience
• 7+ years of experience in data management/governance, data engineering, technical project management, business intelligence, or analysis-based environments
• 3+ years of success leading complex analytical projects and/or developing innovative solutions with multi-function collaborators
• Demonstrated ability to develop collaborative relationships across functions and inspire trust and confidence through effective communication and interpersonal skills
• Demonstrated analytical and creative problem-solving skills that enable turning stakeholder vision and requirements into tactical outcomes in a way that meets best practices while supporting efficient project delivery

• Strong written and oral communication skills that translate across complex technical data and clear business language
• Expertise in SQL, Python, data analysis, governance & data quality tools (Alation, Collibra, Informatica, Anomalo) and agile tools (JIRA, GitHub)

• Experience in designing, documenting, and governance of semantic models, including business glossary development, metadata management, and data lineage
• Familiarity and experience working with Data Governance programs, covering data compliance, classification, and metadata standards
• Knowledge of and experience with data security approaches and implementations
• Solid understanding of legal and privacy implications to data management
• Deep understanding of data warehousing and integration architecture, inclusive of experience working with cloud platforms and data warehouses in large data environments
• Familiarity with AI and machine learning concepts
• Ability to thrive in a dynamic and fast-paced operational environment where change is the norm

Preferred Qualifications

• Master’s degree in Information Systems, Computer Science, Business Management, or relevant technical field
• Experience with visualization tools (Tableau, Power BI, Cognos)

The hiring range for this position in Burbank, Glendale, Anaheim, and Bristol is $161,300 to $186,600 per year and in NYC and Seattle is $169,000 to $195,500 per year. The base pay actually offered will take into account internal equity and also may vary depending on the candidate’s geographic region, job-related knowledge, skills, and experience among other factors. A bonus and/or long-term incentive units may be provided as part of the compensation package, in addition to the full range of medical, financial, and/or other benefits, dependent on the level and position offered. This position can be located near any Disney Hub (Burbank, Anaheim, Glendale, Orlando, Bristol, New York, or Seattle) with potential opportunities for remote work.