Chief Development Architect

SAP•Chicago, IL

28d•Hybrid

About The Position

SAP Labs, LLC seeks a Chief Development Architect at our Chicago, IL location to guide business strategy based on technological advancements. This role involves influencing and guiding technology strategies across cloud business and broader SAP, acting as a trusted advisor to engineering leadership, and aligning technology vision with business and technology priorities. The architect will maintain strategic alignment with corporate strategy and external stakeholders, lead teams across the cloud business with a One SAP Mindset, and build a leading brand through speaking at conferences and publishing whitepapers. A key responsibility is creating a blueprint for tech strategy in collaboration with product & engineering to transform software into a modern services-based architecture, applying domain-driven design principles to influence cross-enterprise architecture. The role requires balancing long-term and near-term priorities, exercising judgment in selecting methods for solutions, and designing/reviewing complex system/solution architectures for high performance, availability, security, and hyperscale delivery. The architect will also be responsible for preventing and resolving significant business-impacting technological fires, leading innovation, resolving conflicts between innovation and standardization, and guiding teams to critically analyze requirements. Additionally, the role involves recruiting and interviewing senior and chief architects, identifying, developing, and growing architecture talent, and building an architect community. The architect will arbitrate technology decisions, author technical documentation, use programming languages and tools to prove hypotheses and model solutions, and mentor technical and non-technical staff. Participation in sales efforts and customer interactions for technology guidance, and influencing SAP-wide technology standards, guidelines, and principles are also expected.

Requirements

Bachelor’s degree or foreign equivalent in Computer Science, Software Engineering, or a related field of study and ten (10) years of experience in the job offered or related occupation. Employer will accept pre-bachelor's experience.
Alternatively, a Master’s degree or foreign equivalent in Computer Science, Software Engineering, or a related field of study and eight (8) years of experience in the job offered or related occupation.
Software Architecture Design and Communication
CI/CD methodologies and tools, including IAC, GitOps, argocd, and helm
Performance testing methodologies and tools including Gatling, K6, and Fortio
Observability tools and protocols including Prometheus, Grafana, Opensearch, Splunk, and OTEL
Docker Container technology and Kubernetes including usage, security, networking orchestration (Gardener project), extension (controllers), and implementation on AWS, Azure, and GCP
SAP BTP Runtimes and Services, including Cloud Foundry and Kyma
Golang programming language
Network Protocols including TCP, TLS, HTTP, and DNS
Web technologies including Load balancers, Proxies, and Content Delivery Network
Envoy Proxy and Envoy-based API Gateways and Service Meshes (Istio)
Collaborating with 3rd-party software providers, contributing to multiple Open-Source projects, and managing commercial vendor relations.

Responsibilities

Influence and guide the technology strategies across cloud business and broader SAP.
Be a trusted advisor to engineering leadership & align technology vision with their business and technology priorities.
Maintain strategic alignment with corporate strategy and external stakeholders such as analysts, customers, partners and vendors.
Lead teams across the cloud business using One SAP Mindset.
Create a leading brand by speaking at conferences, publishing whitepapers, both internally and externally to SAP.
Create a blueprint of tech strategy in collaboration with product & engineering to transform software into a modern services-based architecture.
Apply domain driven design principles to create and influence cross enterprise architecture.
Balance long term and near-term priorities.
Exercise judgment, within broadly defined practices and policies, in selecting methods, techniques, and evaluation criteria for obtaining solutions.
Design and review complex system/solution architecture to ensure a highly performant, highly available secure software product delivery at hyperscale.
Prevent and fight significant business-impacting technological fires.
Change the norm and lead innovation by influencing up & down and across SAP cloud business.
Resolve conflicts between innovation and standardization.
Guide teams to critically analyze requirements to do the right thing, not just what they are asked to do.
Recruit and interview senior and chief architects.
Identify, develop and grow architecture talent across the business group.
Build and retain an architect community that engages in cross-domain topics.
Arbitrate technology decisions across many architecture domains.
Author clear technical documentation and presentations to communicate architecture and design options to educate engineering teams and product managers.
Use computer programming languages & tools to prove hypotheses and to model out solutions.
Mentor and coach technical & non-technical staff in the field of architecture.
Participate / Assist in Sales efforts and/or interact with customers to provide technology guidance.
Influence SAP-wide technology standards, guidelines & principles in collaboration with other SAP product teams.