About

David Peña Arias

Data & Analytics Leader · Operating Models · Transformation
BSc Industrial Engineering · MSc Data Science & Analytics
Lean Six Sigma Black Belt · Scrum & Waterfall Certified

About me

Data and analytics leader who fixes the operating model behind the numbers. I build governed data products and the ownership, decision rights, and adoption paths that make analytics trusted and used — at Amazon and Roche, across procurement, customer operations, and global planning.

My center of gravity is people leadership at global scale, both technical and non-technical programs, products, and processes. I own strategy, execution, delivery, and adoption for cross-functional work where the stakes are high and the path forward is unclear. That core is backed by hands-on experience in BI and analytics, operational excellence solutions, and AI-enabled automation.

I combine Lean Six Sigma rigor, PM level delivery discipline, fast and agile prototyping, and strong data fluency to close the gap between strategy and execution. I work credibly with both engineering teams and business leadership without losing fidelity on either side.

I am also deeply invested in developing the people I work with. I have grown teams, mentored individuals across functions and levels, and built the operating rhythms and development structures that help people advance. High-performing teams are not found; they are built through clear expectations, real coaching, and trust. My teams have consistently scored in the top quartile for engagement, career satisfaction, and inclusion.

The throughline

The arc is deliberate. I started as an industrial engineer, moved into Lean and Six Sigma, then into program and portfolio management, then product and data solutions leadership, and most recently into data and AI-enablement transformation. Each stage compounded the one before it rather than replacing it.

The engineering foundation gave me systems thinking and the discipline to break complex problems into solvable parts. Six Sigma gave me a rigorous toolkit for root-cause analysis, quantified outcomes, and building the case for change. Program management gave me delivery instincts that hold across Agile, Waterfall, and the hybrid reality most organizations actually live in. Product experience added the final layer: that adoption is a design problem, not a training problem, and that the real measure of any solution is whether the organization actually uses it to make different decisions.

The type of problem I am drawn to has not changed: cross-functional, high-stakes, genuinely ambiguous. The kind where the gap between what the organization wants to do and what it can currently do is wide. That gap is where I work.

Career

Slice by domain

See how I apply the same core experience across data, product, program, process, and people leadership.

Feb 2026 – Present

Analytics & Insights Lead, Data Solutions, Global Procurement

Roche

Leading the end-to-end analytics transformation for Roche Global Procurement. Moving a fragmented SAP BW/HANA, Alteryx, and Excel estate toward governed Snowflake + dbt data products with Business, IT, and Finance ownership. Work packages are approved and in progress; first measured outcomes are not claimed yet.
Built the program-management backbone for a global procurement data transformation: approved work packages, intake, prioritization, roadmap planning, RAID, decision logs, milestone tracking, change control, and senior-leadership readouts across Business, IT, Finance, governance, analytics, and platform teams.
Defined the Global Procurement data-product operating model: dataset-by-default, promotion to certified data products by criteria, named ownership, grain, lineage, access, refresh, support path, lifecycle gates, and roadmap trade-offs.
Designed controls to reduce operational fragility: ownership boundaries, lineage, dual-run validation, change control, release gates, DEV/TEST/PROD controls, and documented support paths for legacy-to-Snowflake migration.
Lead a global procurement data enablement function across data engineering, BI engineering, data stewardship, analytics, and platform delivery. Driving migration from SAP BW/HANA, OPERA, Alteryx, Excel, and fragmented BI into a governed Snowflake + dbt model with GitLab CI/CD and DEV/TEST/PROD controls.
Built early data-engineering capacity by hiring/securing three data engineers in the first 90 days at Roche, then pairing new technical talent with domain SMEs through Snowflake, dbt, and DataOps onboarding paths.
Aug 2025 – Jan 2026

Sr. Manager, Data Products & Solutions, Operational Excellence

Amazon

Owned the global portfolio of data products, BI, and AI automation for CS Operational Excellence. Set strategy, roadmaps, and portfolio governance aligned to VP objectives. Led the multi-year Customer Service Operational Planning system from concept through discovery, design, build, and scaled adoption. Operated PMO mechanisms (intake/triage, dependency and risk/RAID, change control, status reporting) to drive cross-region execution.
Owned roadmap, execution governance, intake, triage, backlog alignment, dependency management, RAID, release sequencing, status reporting, and executive escalation for a global portfolio of data, BI, ML, and AI initiatives aligned to senior-executive priorities.
Owned the product roadmap for internal data, BI, ML, and AI products supporting operational planning, forecasting, performance management, and senior-leadership decision mechanisms, converting vague operational pain points into scoped product bets and adoption plans.
Standardized workflows, quality gates, review cadences, documentation, change control, and delivery mechanisms across regions, moving teams from reactive deep dives toward structured monitoring, decision support, and proactive issue detection.
Led distributed teams of data engineers, BI engineers, data scientists, analysts, software engineers, product managers, and UX designers. Standardized data modeling, SQL practices, BI quality gates, reusable components, and MLOps/DataOps guardrails across concurrent analytics initiatives.
Led distributed cross-functional teams across data engineering, data science, BI, product, UX, and software engineering, balancing stakeholder demand with capacity and coaching teams through ambiguous planning, AI/ML, and analytics work.
Oct 2022 – Aug 2025

Sr. Manager, Products & Solutions, Customer Excellence & Insights

Amazon

Led a global portfolio of internal products and programs (ROI estimation, headcount planning, anomaly detection, LLM pilots), influencing ~$4M+ in annualized business impact and streamlining global workforce planning. Scaled technical team from 1.5 to 10 FTE. Re-architected ROI tooling toward Python/Streamlit on AWS. Established Scrum, MLOps, and reusable delivery standards across a distributed cross-functional organization.
Delivered ROI, workforce planning, GenAI coaching, and anomaly detection platforms through charters, benefits cases, KPI tracking, risk reviews, release gates, readiness reviews, support handoffs, and executive escalation.
Productized ROI estimation, workforce planning, and Coach Kai by replacing fragmented calculators and expert-dependent workflows with trusted self-service products, adoption paths, documentation, and support expectations.
Consolidated fragmented spreadsheets and legacy tools into governed mechanisms for ROI estimation, workforce planning, AI coaching, and anomaly detection. Embedded audit trails, standardized logic, quality checks, bulk operations, and exception-based monitoring to reduce rework and improve control.
Architected a cloud-native analytics and data-product family on Python/Streamlit + AWS. Led ROI and workforce-planning migration patterns, RAG coaching on Bedrock/Claude, anomaly-detection work, and reusable MLOps patterns for deployment, monitoring, CI/CD, and governance.
Scaled a cross-functional product and build team from 1.5 to 10 FTE, increasing technical capacity by 567%. Drove highest engagement scores in the department, top-quartile leadership-behavior results, 4.78/5.0 communication effectiveness, and 100% favorable ratings on inclusion, direction-setting, and obstacle removal.
Feb 2022 – Oct 2022

Sr. Manager, Internal Mechanisms & Solutions

Amazon

Directed the global analytics and BI strategy for internal operational products, including automated portfolio management and headcount planning. Established project governance, OKR frameworks, and executive reporting mechanisms. Led Agile/Scrum delivery across distributed teams, managing backlogs, dependencies, and release cycles.
Established standardized intake, prioritization, OKR, executive-reporting, change-control, release-management, and portfolio-review mechanisms that improved transparency, alignment, and delivery predictability across a matrixed global organization.
Defined roadmaps and operating mechanisms for global decision-support tools, aligning stakeholders on user problems, success metrics, ownership, and release cadence before the broader data and AI product portfolio scaled.
Implemented governance, change control, release management, versioning, and standardized reporting so calculation logic, metric definitions, process changes, and release decisions became traceable and easier to audit.
Defined analytics product roadmaps and reporting mechanisms for global decision-support tools, including metric definitions, KPI scorecards, SQL- and BI-based dashboards, validation practices, and executive reporting.
Coached distributed teams through Agile/Scrum delivery practices, stakeholder communication expectations, change control, release management, and cross-functional decision cadence.
Nov 2019 – Feb 2022

Sr. Program Manager, Global Programs

Amazon

Designed and governed a global portfolio management framework for cross-functional continuous improvement initiatives. Built operating mechanisms and toolkits (process standards, dashboards, collaboration workflows) that aligned teams across regions. Ran Agile and Waterfall delivery for key products and process improvements.
Designed and deployed a global portfolio-management framework with dashboards, scorecards, status-reporting templates, risk reviews, collaboration models, and executive visibility across cross-functional initiatives, improving prioritization, resource allocation, and delivery predictability.
Turned portfolio and reporting needs into reusable decision-support products for prioritization, resource allocation, and executive visibility, standardizing metric definitions and reporting templates so regional leaders could act from a common interpretation of the numbers.
Standardized project workflows, problem-solving templates, KPI definitions, reporting packs, and collaboration models across regions to improve prioritization, reduce operational risk, and make continuous improvement an operating discipline rather than a set of one-off wins.
Designed global analytics and BI frameworks using Power BI, Tableau, QuickSight, KPI scorecards, and tracking mechanisms, raising data quality and improving data-informed decisions for regional and country leaders.
Led cross-regional program teams through continuous-improvement work, standardizing collaboration models, project workflows, accountability mechanisms, and dashboards for teams working across multiple regions and functions.

Earlier experience

Nov 2018 – Nov 2019

Sr. Program Manager, Continuous Improvement Strategy (Europe) · Amazon

Led regional CI strategy and analytics initiatives across European Customer Service operations.
Oct 2016 – Nov 2018

Manager, Continuous Improvement (Spain) · Amazon

Designed and executed the Spain CS continuous-improvement strategy, with WWCS Kaizen of the Year as one recognition point.
Mar 2016 – Oct 2016

Kaizen Promotion Officer · Amazon

Deployed Lean methodologies and standard work across Customer Service sites.
May 2014 – Mar 2016

Sr. Business Analyst · Amazon

Supply chain analytics and process improvement for global Customer Service operations.
Sep 2012 – May 2014

Project Manager, Technical · Emerson Electric

Technical project management in industrial automation and manufacturing.
Jul 2011 – Sep 2012

Business Analyst · L.L. Bean

Operational analytics and reporting for a direct-to-consumer supply chain.
Oct 2008 – Jul 2011

Inventory Planner · L.L. Bean

Demand forecasting, inventory optimization, and supply chain decision-making.

Skills

A practical mix of leadership, delivery, data, and technical skills I use to turn ambiguous work into systems teams can run.

Leadership

People leadershipHiring and onboardingCoachingRole designCapability buildingExecutive alignment

Data and analytics

Data productsGoverned BIMetric definitionsSemantic layersKPI scorecardsData storytelling

Technical

PythonSQLSnowflakedbtAWSStreamlitETL/ELTCI/CDDEV/TEST/PROD

Product, program, and process

Product discoveryRoadmapsPortfolio governanceRAIDChange controlLean Six SigmaDMAICStandard work

AI and automation

RAG assistantsLLM evaluationPrompt orchestrationAnomaly detectionMLOpsDataOpsAI guardrails

Tools

Power BITableauQuickSightJIRAConfluenceAsanaLucidchartFigmaAdvanced Excel

Want to connect?

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What I do best

Data products and governed BI

ML, analytics, data engineering, AWS services, low-code apps
Portfolio governance and operating mechanisms

Roadmaps, intake/triage, RAID, dependency tracking, status reporting
Operational excellence and process transformation

Lean Six Sigma, root-cause analysis, process redesign, measurable impact
People leadership and capability building

Team building, coaching, structured growth paths, top-quartile engagement
Governance, adoption and stakeholder alignment

OKRs, change management, executive readouts, decision frameworks
Executive communication and decision frameworks

Narrative-led reviews, business cases, KPI scorecards for senior stakeholders

Quick facts

Madrid, Spain

Current location
San José, Costa Rica

Relocation in process
Authorized to work in Costa Rica & EU
Senior Leadership · Senior IC

Target roles
Remote · Hybrid

Work arrangement
Spanish (native) · English (fluent)
MSc Data Science & Analytics

Universidad de Alcalá, Spain

BSc Industrial Engineering

UIA, Costa Rica
Certified

Lean Six Sigma Black Belt · Scrum PO · Scrum Master · Design Thinking

Want a copy?

Download a role-focused PDF resume. Each version follows the same structure and emphasizes the examples, skills, and proof most relevant to that domain.

Program Management

Portfolio governance, delivery control, RAID, change management, executive cadence, and cross-functional execution.

Product Management

Discovery, roadmap ownership, productized workflows, launch discipline, adoption, and success metrics.

Process Improvement

Lean Six Sigma, controls, root-cause analysis, standard work, risk reduction, and sustained operating mechanisms.

Data Engineering & Analytics

Snowflake, dbt, AWS, BI, data products, metric governance, AI/ML workflows, and decision-grade analytics.

People Development & Leadership

Team building, hiring, coaching, capability uplift, engagement, and leadership through ambiguity.

How I Work

Principles that show up in every project

Work backward from the decision

I start with the decision, user, or business outcome the work is meant to improve. Then I work backward into the data, process, ownership, and system changes needed to make that outcome real.

This keeps teams from building impressive things that do not change anything.

Build mechanisms, not heroics

A good result should not depend on one person remembering the rule, chasing the update, or explaining the number every month.

I build mechanisms: intake paths, review cadences, decision logs, ownership models, validation checks, scorecards, and release controls. The point is simple. Make the right work easier to repeat, and make hidden risk harder to ignore.

Build, test, simplify

I do not believe in designing perfect systems from a distance. I build early, test with real users, learn where the friction is, and simplify from there.

A rough working version teaches more than a polished plan that has never touched reality.

Diagnose the real constraint

The stated problem is rarely the real problem.

A broken dashboard may be an ownership issue. A slow program may be a decision-rights issue. A data-quality issue may be a process-control issue upstream.

I slow down early so the team does not spend months solving the wrong problem faster.

Design for adoption and durability

A platform nobody uses has not succeeded. A dashboard nobody trusts has not succeeded. A process people work around has not succeeded.

I design for the people who have to live with the system: clear enough to use, simple enough to maintain, documented enough to hand off, and trusted enough to change decisions.

Build the team that can sustain the work

Delivery fails when the system depends on one expert, one hero, or one person holding all the context.

I invest in people because it is the only way the work survives beyond the first launch. That means clear roles, honest feedback, skill growth, succession, and enough structure for people to do strong work without burning out.