---
title: 'Staff Data Engineer at Fora Financial'
canonical: 'https://feeny.ai/job/staff-data-engineer-fora-financial-remote-1x147gt1xnp7'
type: 'job'
last_seen: '2026-09-07'
---

# Staff Data Engineer at Fora Financial

- **Company:** Fora Financial
- **Location:** Remote
- **Work type:** remote
- **Posted:** 2026-06-30
- **Last confirmed live:** 2026-09-07
- **Apply:** https://job-boards.greenhouse.io/forafinancial/jobs/4298234009

## Job description

Staff Data Engineer

## About the role

Fora is in the process of modernizing its data stack to build the foundation for agentic products and analytics. To lead this effort, we are hiring a Staff Data Engineer to build and own the platform backbone for governed reporting and trusted AI workflows.

This is a hands-on Staff IC role on a small Data & AI team. You will make strategic architecture calls—from ingestion patterns and Snowflake design to data contracts and SLAs—and then get into the weeds to build, harden, or rebuild pipelines.

We are looking for a systems thinker who understands business impact and operational burden, and who can partner closely with Analytics, Engineering, and vendors to turn fragmented source systems into trustworthy data products.

## What you will own

Architecture & Strategy

- Data platform architecture: ingestion patterns, warehouse design, environment strategy, orchestration, access governance, and reliability standards.
- Freshness & ingestion strategy: Deciding when to use streaming versus batch based on business value, cost, and operational burden.
- Cross-functional partnership: Partnering with Platform Engineering to ensure our data infrastructure integrates securely and reliably with core operational systems.

Execution & Reliability

- Data Integrations: requirements → source profiling → ingestion design → QA → documentation → support.
- Pipeline reliability: dependencies, retries, alerts, backfills, incident response, runbooks, monitoring, and support expectations.
- Legacy migration: helping retire brittle reporting paths such as Azure Data Factory, SQL backup workflows, and other duplicate pipelines.

Governance & Quality

- Snowflake governance: roles, permissions, service accounts, connector ownership, environment separation, performance, cost, and governance.
- Data contracts: schema-change handling, new-field availability, upstream SLAs, source defects, and escalation paths.
- Data observability: freshness, volume movement, nulls, duplicates, reconciliation, anomaly detection, and critical business-rule checks.
- AI-enabled leverage: using AI and automation to accelerate debugging, documentation, pipeline scaffolding, and operational workflows.

## What we are looking for

- Deep data engineering judgment. You have designed, built, and operated production platforms, not just individual pipelines.
- Hands-on depth. You move seamlessly from high-level architecture to writing production code, standing up CI/CD workflows, and debugging pipeline failures.
- Strong ingestion fundamentals. APIs, CDC, backfills, idempotency, schema drift, and failure recovery.
- Snowflake fluency. Warehouse design, RBAC, performance tuning, and cost controls.
- Data quality discipline. You know which checks matter and make quality visible before users find issues.
- Ownership & communication. You can sequence ambiguous work, write useful design docs, align technical decisions with business outcomes, and carry problems to resolution.
- Cross-functional partnership. You work with stakeholders across Engineering, Analytics, and the business to understand needs, define clear requirements, and build trust.
- AI leverage. You use LLMs and agents to accelerate your own work, and you build data products that agents can consume safely.

## Nice to have

- Lending, fintech, or financial-services data experience.
- CDC, Debezium, dbt Cloud, Dagster, Airflow, or equivalent tooling.
- Fluency with Azure data services such as Event Hubs, Blob Storage, Azure SQL, and Azure DevOps.
- Data observability with Monte Carlo, Elementary, dbt tests, custom monitors, or similar.
- Data contracts, source SLAs, or schema-change processes with Engineering teams.
- AI-native analytics, semantic layers, MCP servers, agentic orchestration, or governed context retrieval.
- Familiarity with open table formats such as Apache Iceberg.

## Compensation and logistics

- Base salary: $175,000–$200,000
- Fully remote within the US; Eastern or Central time zones preferred.
- Reports to the VP of Data & AI.
- Final compensation is based on scope of past ownership, technical judgment, and ability to set direction independently.

## Benefits of working at Fora Financial

- Company-subsidized medical, dental, and vision plans.
- 401(k) plan with company match.
- Life insurance at no cost to employees.
- Generous time off plan, including rollover vacation days.
- Health care and dependent care flexible spending accounts.
- Commuter benefits.
- Remote working model.
- Weekly breakfast, snacks, and Friday lunches provided onsite.

## About Fora Financial

Fora Financial is a technology-enabled provider of flexible financing to small and medium-sized businesses. Since 2008, we have supported more than 55,000 merchants nationwide with over $4 billion in capital for operating expenses, cash-flow management, and growth.

Our proprietary technology helps deliver capital through a streamlined process that can be completed in as little as 24 hours, compared with the weeks or months often required for a traditional bank loan. Fora has grown from two founders in a small Manhattan workspace to a company of nearly 200 employees with a collaborative, partner-centric culture.

## Equal Opportunity Statement

Fora Financial is an Equal Opportunity Employer. We are committed to a diverse and inclusive workplace where all individuals are treated with respect and dignity. We do not discriminate on the basis of race, color, religion, sex, gender identity, sexual orientation, national origin, disability, age, veteran status, or any other legally protected status under local, state, or federal law. Fora Financial provides reasonable accommodations for qualified individuals with disabilities.

## About Fora Financial

## Company Overview
- **One-liner**: Fora Financial provides fast, flexible working capital and financing solutions to small and mid-sized businesses across the United States.
- **Entity Type**: Private (PE-backed; majority stake held by Palladium Equity Partners)
- **Headquarters**: New York, NY (Midtown) and Miami, FL (Downtown) – dual headquarters.
- **Founded**: 2008 (originally as Paramount Merchant Funding; rebranded to Fora Financial in 2015)
- **Founders**: Jared Feldman (CEO) and Dan Smith (Co-Founder & Board Member)

## Core Business
- **Primary industry**: Alternative small-business lending / Fintech
- **Target customers**: Small and mid-sized businesses (SMBs) across 49 states (B2B)
- **Mission statement**: "To provide funding to small businesses, so that they can grow and succeed."

## Products & Services
- **Business Term Loan**: Fixed-term financing up to $1.5 million with approval decisions in as little as 4 hours and terms up to 18 months.
- **Revenue Advance**: A flexible advance based on future revenue with daily or weekly payments; no hard credit pull.
- **Line of Credit**: Revolving credit facility for ongoing working capital needs.
- **Equipment Financing**: Funding specifically for purchasing business equipment.
- **SBA Loan**: Government-backed small business loans offered through partner network.

## Market Standing
- **Valuation/Market Cap**: Not publicly available (private company)
- **Key Metric**: Over $5 billion in total capital provided to more than 55,000 small businesses since 2008 (as of latest 2024 update)
- **Notable Investors/Partners**:
  - Palladium Equity Partners (majority equity stake)
  - Celtic Bank (strategic partnership for commercial financing)
  - Multiple asset-backed securitizations (e.g., $130 million ABS in 2024) and revolving credit facilities (e.g., $200 million facility)
- **Growth Signals**:
  - Expanded to Miami with a new Downtown office in 2024
  - 100% year-over-year growth since inception (historical claim)
  - Headcount of nearly 200 employees, with active hiring in accounting, business development, risk/analytics, strategic partnerships, and technology
  - Successfully completed SOC 2 Type II examination

## Competitive Advantages
- **Speed & Accessibility**: Approval decisions in as little as 4 hours with funding within 24 hours; no hard credit pulls
- **Proven Track Record**: Over $5 billion lent, 55,000+ businesses served, operating since 2008
- **Technology Platform**: Proprietary platform for faster, more accurate lending decisions, especially for traditionally hard-to-fund applicants
- **Diverse Product Suite**: Offers term loans, revenue advances, lines of credit, equipment financing, and SBA loans – covering most small-business capital needs
- **Capital Strength**: Multiple securitizations and credit facilities demonstrate strong access to capital markets

## Strategic Focus
- **Continued capital expansion** through asset-backed securitizations and new credit facilities
- **Geographic diversification** with a growing Miami presence alongside the New York headquarters
- **Technology modernization** under CTO Michael Chiang, with open roles for VP of Data & AI and VP of Product
- **Partnership growth** via strategic relationships like the Celtic Bank collaboration

## Why Work Here
- **Culture**: Casual-yet-professional environment with a "family-like camaraderie"; core values include Innovation, Integrity, Collaboration, and Approachability
- **Work Model**: Hybrid home/office model emphasizing work-life balance; some roles are fully remote (e.g., Strategic Partnerships Manager, VP of Data and AI, VP of Product)
- **Perks & Benefits**:
  - Competitive salaries, health/dental/vision insurance, 401k with matching, flexible spending accounts, gym reimbursement, generous time off
  - Daily breakfasts and snacks, weekly catered lunches, relaxed dress code, happy hours in the "Chill Lounge", game room (NY), on-site fitness center (Miami)
- **Locations**: Midtown New York (1385 Broadway) and Downtown Miami (333 SE Second Avenue) – both in vibrant, amenity-rich neighborhoods
- **Growth**: Small team sizes promoting open communication; clear advancement opportunities; nearly 200 employees and growing

## Sources
1. [forafinancial.com](https://www.forafinancial.com/about-us/)
2. [greenhouse.io](http://job-boards.greenhouse.io/forafinancial)
3. [forafinancial.com/careers](https://www.forafinancial.com/about-us/careers/)
4. [forafinancial.com/leadership](https://www.forafinancial.com/about-us/leadership/)
5. [forafinancial.com (products)](https://www.forafinancial.com/)

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