Data Architect

Position Title: Data Architect & Analytics Team Lead; Status: Full-time Permanent; Reports to: Associate VP Technology and Software Development; Location: Toronto, ON; Start Date: November 2026

Company Description

The Canadian Football League is Canada's home for professional football. With over a century of rich history and nine member teams across the nation, the CFL provides world-class entertainment and excitement to a passionate and dedicated fan base. A season-long journey of unforgettable moments and must-see-TV broadcasts culminates in Canada’s largest single-day sporting event – the Grey Cup, where the newly crowned champions earn the right to hoist the iconic emblem of Canadian football.

The CFL is dedicated to entertaining fans in Canada and abroad. The league pursues that goal through a continuing commitment to modernize and elevate both the game and the business. The CFL is transforming its digital ecosystem and maximizing fan engagement through captivating content, data analytics, personalized marketing, and more.

Just as important as its industry-leading operations, the CFL proudly champions the values on which Canada was built – unity, diversity, inclusion, strength, and service to the community. The league is supportive of all peoples, cultures, and backgrounds, offering a respectful and inclusive working and playing environment, centered on acceptance and understanding. The CFL's successes are measured not only on the field and within its ranks, but also in its unparalleled impact in affecting positive change and bettering Canadian communities and lives.

Position Summary

The Canadian Football League is seeking an ambitious, technically strong business leader to build the next generation of its data and analytics capability. This role is designed for someone who worked in technology, analytics, software, consulting, engineering, or business intelligence before completing an MBA or equivalent graduate degree.

This is not a traditional data architecture role. You will work directly with executives, business leaders, and stakeholders across the League and its clubs to understand business opportunities, design solutions, and personally build the data pipelines, models, reporting structures, and analytical assets that support better decision-making.

You will also help establish how the CFL uses modern data technologies and data-focused AI capabilities to improve analytics, reporting, forecasting, fan engagement, business operations, digital products, commercial initiatives, and league-wide strategy.

Most importantly, you will help build the analytics function itself: the team, processes, standards, technology choices, and culture required to make data a long-term strategic asset for one of Canada’s most recognized sports and entertainment organizations.

Key Responsibilities

• Design and implement the CFL’s analytics architecture, data models, semantic layers, data marts, and reporting ecosystem.
• Build and maintain SQL-based ETL/ELT pipelines, data transformation workflows, and trusted datasets for business reporting.
• Establish data governance, documentation, quality standards, KPI definitions, and reporting best practices.
• Partner with executives and department leaders to translate business goals into measurable KPIs, dashboards, and analytical solutions.
• Identify opportunities to improve decision-making across fan engagement, commercial, digital, club support, media, and league operations.
• Help establish and grow the CFL’s new analytics team.
• Create development standards, operating practices, and a culture of accountability, curiosity, innovation, and continuous improvement.
• Write and optimize complex SQL queries and build reporting datasets, analytical models, and dashboards.
• Work with modern cloud and data technologies, including Snowflake, dbt, Python, SQL Server, Power BI, cloud data services, and ETL/ELT platforms.
• Troubleshoot data quality, integration, and performance issues while remaining directly involved in hands‑on implementation.
• Identify where AI can enhance analytics, reporting, forecasting, data quality, and decision support.
• Evaluate and implement AI capabilities within the data ecosystem, with an emphasis on responsible, practical business value.

Qualifications & Skills

• MBA, master’s degree, or equivalent combination of education and experience; candidates with technical work experience prior to an MBA are strongly preferred.
• Advanced SQL skills and experience designing or developing reporting, analytics, data engineering, or business intelligence solutions.
• Strong business acumen and the ability to connect technical solutions to organizational outcomes in a sports, entertainment, media, or consumer business context.
• Demonstrated leadersh