Michael Hilton
Oakland, CASenior Data & Cloud Infrastructure Engineer
15+ Years in Data Engineering, Enterprise Cloud Architecture & Streaming ETL
Executive Summary
Senior Data and Cloud Infrastructure Engineer with over 15 years of experience across data engineering, streaming ETL, cloud migration, and enterprise solutions architecture. Deep expertise in Google Cloud Platform (GCP), Python, distributed pipelines, and DevOps automation. Extensive history architecting and delivering high-availability cloud infrastructure and mission-critical data solutions for Fortune 500 enterprises within Google Professional Services (PSO) and Alooma.
Technical Skills & Core Competencies
Cloud & Infrastructure
Google Cloud Platform (GCP)
BigQuery
Cloud Dataflow
Cloud Storage
Networking
GKE / Kubernetes
Data Engineering & Warehousing
Real-time Streaming ETL
Data Pipeline Architecture
BigQuery
Snowflake
Redshift
PostgreSQL
MySQL
SQL Server
Oracle
NoSQL
Redis
Apache Spark
Data Modeling & Schema Design
Query Optimization
Software & Languages
Python
SQL
Java
Bash
Docker
Terraform
DevOps, SRE & Methodologies
CI/CD Automation
Git Workflow
Test Automation
Site Reliability Engineering (SRE)
Data Quality Auditing
Technical Consulting & Mentorship
People Stuff
Stakeholder Management
Consensus Building
Scope Negotiation & Trade-off Management
Workshop Facilitation & Discovery
Relationship Governance
Risk & Blocker De-escalation
Scrum, Agile, etc.
Work Experience
Cloud Solutions Architect / Senior Data Engineer (PSO)
2019 – Present
Alooma was acquired by Google in early 2019; absorbed into Google's Professional Services Organization (PSO).
- Architected and delivered end-to-end cloud infrastructure, migration strategies, and enterprise data pipelines for Fortune 500 customers, ensuring high availability, fault tolerance, and multi-region scalability.
- Led complex cloud migrations and modernization initiatives, dramatically reducing infrastructure costs and improving system throughput via GCP services.
- Partnered closely with customer stakeholders and executive leadership to align technical architectures with strategic business objectives, accelerating time-to-market for mission-critical applications.
- Collaborated directly with Google Product and Engineering teams to provide customer feedback, driving product improvements and directly influencing roadmaps for core GCP data services.
- Mentored and upskilled customer engineering organizations on modern cloud best practices, DevOps methodologies, and Site Reliability Engineering (SRE) principles.
Alooma
Redwood City, CA Acquired by GoogleTechnical Solutions Engineer & SME
2016 – 2019
Real-time streaming ETL platform moving transactional data into cloud warehouses (acquired by Google in 2019).
- Designed and implemented scalable real-time data integration pipelines, enabling enterprise clients to seamlessly ingest, transform, and load massive streaming datasets into Redshift, Snowflake, and BigQuery.
- Served as the technical subject matter expert during onboarding and enterprise implementation phases, troubleshooting complex data infrastructure bottlenecks and optimizing query performance.
- Developed custom integrations and connector plugins in Python and Java to expand platform capabilities and support diverse customer data sources and destinations.
- Partnered with Sales and Product teams to deliver technical demonstrations, scope engineering requirements, and translate enterprise pain points into actionable platform features.
Schoolzilla
Oakland, CAData Systems Engineer
2013 – 2016
Enterprise data warehouse platform providing analytics and visualization solutions for K-12 education.
- Formulated and implemented audit strategies to guarantee enterprise-grade data quality and consistency.
- Provided architectural guidance on data storage solutions and schema optimizations for high-volume records.
- Developed software solutions in R, SQL, and Python to ingest, clean, validate, and visualize incoming multidimensional data.
- Managed technical working relationships with in-house developers and external vendors.
KIPP Foundation
San Francisco, CAData Systems Analyst & Collection Specialist
2011 – 2016
National charter school network providing college-preparatory education to underserved communities.
- Designed and executed automated audit routines and ETL pipelines to validate, store, and report on educational data across a nationwide network of schools.
- Engineered complex SQL queries and ETL processes for executive analytics and operational reporting.
- Managed and improved web-input collection systems to maximize data accuracy and intake efficiency.
- Constructed validated data models and exhibits that directly supported multi-million-dollar grant applications.
Net Impact
San Francisco, CAProgram Intern / Data Analyst
2010 – 2011
Global professional network focused on corporate social responsibility.
- Manipulated, cross-referenced, and audited datasets across multiple relational database platforms.
- Calculated chapter distributions and metrics in Excel using pivot tables and advanced formulas.
- Supported technical operations and managed regular communications reaching 3,000+ member organizations.
Selected Projects & Tools
Professional Services Data Validator
Automated validation framework for ETL data pipelines, checking schema compliance, row consistency, and data integrity.
Personal Website & Portfolio
Fast, minimalist personal site and blog template built with Flask, Jinja2, and Frozen-Flask.
Education & Background
University of Michigan
Bachelor of Arts in Political Science and History
Graduated April 2010
Relevant Coursework: History, Politics, Statistics, Economics, Political Modeling (Complex Systems), Game Theory, Legal Theory
Languages
English (Native)
Japanese (Conversational)
French (Conversational)
Interests & Hobbies
3D Printing
Crafting
Open Source Tooling
Video Games
Dogs