Digital Solutions Architect (Hybrid - In Office 10 days/Month)

National Guardian Life Insurance Company • Madison, WI

1d • Hybrid

About The Position

The primary function of the Digital Solutions Architect is to partner with the Business teams, technology teams and external vendor teams to deliver highly scalable, flexible and resilient solution architectures that address business problems. This role possesses a unique balance of technical depth and strong interpersonal skills. The ability to think strategically about business, products, and technical challenges and connect technology with measurable business value and is a critical component of this position. In addition, this role functions as an architect with a strong engineering background especially in solutions architecture, specifically service oriented architecture, and enterprise applications such as cloud computing and software service offerings.

Requirements

• Experience building enterprise applications using modern architecture techniques (serverless, micro services and containerization) and cloud platforms (AWS preferred)
• Possess a solid understanding and experience of architecture patterns including SOA, integration, data, streaming and cloud architecture
• Ability to articulate and can effectively communicate with technical teams, non-technical business leaders, and clients
• Ability to quickly understand business requirements and propose reference architectures and technology solutions. Capable of presenting options and weighing implementation complexities and risks to recommend the right technical decision
• Experience building architectural patterns at scale, including thoughtfully designed application and data solutions, repeatable data pipelines, and efficient software engineering principles
• Knowledge of emerging trends in the digital transformation, technology and architecture space and ability to recommend solutions
• Demonstrated project management leadership
• Demonstrated ability to adapt to new technologies and learn quickly
• Familiarity with architecture frameworks (ITIL, Zachman, TOGAF), architecture processes and architecture governance
• A minimum of five years of relevant hands-on solution architecture/design experience in data, application, infrastructure, or security domains required.
• A minimum of one year of relevant hands-on Solution architecture exposure to building applications on AWS required.
• A minimum of five years of large-scale software development or application engineering with some coding experience in two or more of the following languages: Java, JavaScript, C/C++, C#, Node.js, Python required.

Responsibilities

• Assess proposed business ideas and determines architectural significance.
• Lead the identification and analysis of business drivers to develop solution architecture requirements.
• Analyze technology industry and market trends and determines potential impact upon the enterprise.
• Research and make recommendations on technology build vs. buy decisions.
• Partner with Business and IT Stakeholders and external third-party partners to craft highly scalable, flexible and resilient architectures that address business problems.
• Develop rough cost estimates (RCEs) for various candidate solution architectural options.
• Collaborate with other architects and system specialists to establish technical reference architectures, architecture patterns, and standards to promote enterprise efficiency and agility, ensure solution architecture quality, and ensure alignment of solutions with enterprise architecture directions.
• Drive technology discussions and analyze the current landscape for gaps in addressing business needs.
• Review existing architecture and capabilities from technical perspective and contribute to building architecture and technology roadmaps.
• Determines primary dependent systems and infrastructure; Determines high level system integrations needed to implement the proposed business ideas.
• Develop holistic architectural options, ensuring that all architectural aspects of the system, including data, application, infrastructure, and security are addressed.
• Identify, document, and communicate Architecture standards, patterns, and best practices.
• Participate in the development of enterprise architecture strategies and roadmaps.
• Evolve re-usable architectures and document best practice patterns for cloud-native development in both public and hybrid cloud usage scenarios.
• Evaluate new cloud technologies for fit-for-purpose and socialize architecture recommendations with agile teams.
• Resolve ad hoc architecture and technology support requests from application developers as it relates to developer tools and technologies.
• Incorporate Modern Security practices into architecture design including Zero Trust principles, Threat Modeling, IAM, and compliance framework built into design.
• Incorporate recommendations for practical adoption of Artificial Intelligence and Machine Learning capabilities into solutions within the boundaries of the organizational AI framework.
• Collaborate with agile teams to develop cloud applications by providing architecture guidance and hands-on technical support during all phases of agile SDLC.
• Mentor and develop others.
• Passionate about technology and solving important design challenges.

Benefits

• 20 days of Paid Time Off growing to 25 days after 5 years
• 11 Paid Holidays (10 company holidays and 1 personal holiday of your choice)
• Health care, dental and vision plans
• Up to $1,500 (Family) or $1,000 (Single) annually towards a Health Savings Account
• Annual bonus based on company performance
• Paid Parental Leave
• 401(k) match up to 9%
• Paid Sabbatical after 8 years
• Paid Volunteer Time
• Education Assistance Program
• Employee Recognition Program

What This Job Offers

• Job Type: Full-time
• Career Level: Senior