Python Developer

Messina Group is a Chicago-based consulting firm that partners with Private Equity firms, Investment Banks, and mid-market leadership teams to accelerate value creation through Digital, Data, Analytics & AI, and M&A-focused initiatives. We seek a Python Developer to join our fast-paced, entrepreneurial consulting environment where we blend business strategy, advanced analytics, and modern technology to help clients plan, prioritize, and execute their growth and transformation roadmaps.

About the Role
You’ll work across a portfolio of advanced, real-world systems—both internal and client-facing—collaborating with Messina’s AI Architect, Managing Directors, and client teams. You will operate both as a direct contributor on guided engagements and independently on projects where you own the technical delivery end-to-end. Your work will span:

• AI-powered business platforms and M&A / due diligence tooling
• ERP selection, requirements gathering, and implementation support
• Data-heavy analytics, reporting, dashboards, and process automation
• Legacy system modernization (AS/400, aging ERPs, spreadsheet-driven workflows)
• Salesforce integration, rebate automation, and CRM data engineering
• Client-facing document production: executive overviews, CIM analyses, buyer readiness reports

This is a technical, client-facing, and business analysis role. You’ll turn concepts, partial code, and AI-generated drafts into production-ready implementations, automations, and client-ready deliverables. We’re looking for someone who is genuinely curious, takes ownership, and brings the same energy to a client engagement as they do to a side project.

What You’ll Work On
Engineering & Automation
You’ll build and extend Python 3.12 projects across a range of internal and client-facing use cases. This includes designing data pipelines, CLI tools, Streamlit dashboards, and lightweight web interfaces. You’ll maintain containerized multi-service environments and take AI-generated code from rough draft to something production teams can actually rely on.

• Data pipelines and notebooks for analytics, forensics, and compliance monitoring
• Docker/Docker Compose stacks (Postgres, Redis, Nginx, application services)
• Desktop-packaged applications (PyInstaller) for LAN/kiosk deployment

AI Engineering & LLM Integration
This is a core part of the role. You’ll design reusable prompt frameworks, build and maintain RAG pipelines, and orchestrate workflows across multiple LLM providers. You’ll use AI coding tools every day—and you’ll know when to trust the output and when to rewrite it entirely.

• Prompt engineering: system prompts, chain-of-thought frameworks, few-shot templates, structured outputs
• RAG pipelines: document chunking, embedding, vector search, retrieval strategies
• Multi-model orchestration across OpenAI, Anthropic, Google Gemini, AWS Bedrock, and Azure OpenAI

Data, Analytics & Reporting
You’ll build analytics workflows that surface trends, flag anomalies, and support financial and operational decision-making. This spans everything from raw CSV manipulation to Snowflake schema design to polished executive-facing dashboards. Expect messy, real-world data—and the expectation that you handle it gracefully.

• Trend and anomaly detection across CSV, Excel, and database sources
• Power BI and Microsoft Fabric reporting pipelines
• Streamlit or notebook-based exploration tools with clean, professional charts

Process Automation & Document Processing
You’ll design and implement automated workflows for business processes that are often still running on spreadsheets or manual handoffs. That includes building bridges between systems that lack native APIs, scheduling and orchestrating jobs, and extracting structured data from PDFs and scanned documents.

• RPA-style automation for rebate calculations, dealer onboarding, and approval routing
• OCR and document ingestion pipelines for due diligence data rooms and CIMs
• Scheduled job orchestration with retry logic and alerting

ERP, CRM & Backend Systems
You’ll support ERP evaluation and implementation projects, helping clients assess vendors, gather requirements, and build the integration layers that connect old and new systems. A significant portion of this work involves Salesforce—schema design, SOQL, REST/Bulk APIs, and syncing data to modern warehouses. You’ll also encounter legacy platforms that need pragmatic, incremental modernization rather than rip-and-replace.

• Salesforce-to-warehouse ETL (Snowflake, Postgres, SQL Server)
• Integration layers and data bridges for legacy platforms including IBM AS/400
• M&A and due diligence systems: findings tracking, risk registers, and reporting

Business Analysis & Client Delivery
You’ll work directly with client stakeholders—including PE partners, CFOs, and COOs—to gather requirements, document processes, and translate business needs into technical specs. You’ll also produce the polished written deliverables those conversations lead to: executive overviews, due diligence reports, and requirements documents written for non-technical audiences.

• Lead structured requirements sessions and document use cases, process flows, and gap analyses
• Produce requirements registers, traceability matrices, and prioritization frameworks
• Support ERP selection: vendor evaluation, RFP development, and scoring criteria

Required Qualifications:

• Python 3.10+ with real project experience; CLI tools, data pipelines, or web apps
• Full-stack API integration: REST/GraphQL, authentication, rate limiting, webhooks
• SQL fluency (Postgres, SQL Server, MySQL) and Snowflake experience
• Salesforce: objects, schema, SOQL, REST/Bulk APIs, and integration development
• LLM/AI: prompt engineering, RAG pipelines, multi-model orchestration, structured outputs
• Docker/Docker Compose for multi-service environments
• Git and modern DevOps practices
• Strong written and verbal communication, comfortable presenting to non-technical executives
• Ability to work independently across multiple concurrent engagements

Nice-to-Have:

• Streamlit, Textual, or PyInstaller for internal tools and desktop packaging
• OCR/document processing pipelines (Tesseract, Poppler)
• dbt for Snowflake transformations
• RPA experience (UiPath, Power Automate, or Python-based custom)
• Linux server administration
• Prior consulting, PE, or portfolio company experience

Light travel may be required for select client engagements. A background check is required.