Enterprise Architect

Nelnet Servicing•Lincoln, NE

6d•Hybrid

About The Position

Nelnet Business Services (NBS), a division of Nelnet, Inc., provides payment technology and education services to more than 1,200 higher education institutions, nearly 12,000 K-12 schools, and millions of individual students, families, and supporters across the globe. Our culture of service enables us to form long-lasting and trusted partnerships, while our focus on creativity and innovative solutions empowers our customer communities to thrive. The Enterprise Architect is a senior individual contributor and the primary technical driver for engineering and architecture related to major initiatives. In the near term, this includes serving as the primary technical driver for Horizon, NCC’s strategic platform initiative, and establishing architecture standards and patterns for the responsible use of AI across NCC products. This role defines the technical vision, strategy, and roadmap needed to advance program(s), translating complex business and system requirements into secure, scalable, and integrated architecture. Working with significant autonomy, the architect aligns product, sales, engineering, executives, and clients by communicating technical concepts in clear, audience-appropriate language. This role influences outcomes through deep expertise, strategic judgment, and cross-functional leadership rather than direct people management.

Requirements

10+ years of related experience in enterprise architecture, infrastructure architecture, systems architecture, software engineering, or a comparable technical discipline.
Demonstrated experience defining technical vision, strategy, and roadmaps for complex, cross-functional or enterprise-scale initiatives.
Deep experience designing and integrating secure, scalable solutions across infrastructure, applications, data, networking, and cloud environments.
Experience influencing technical and business decisions with executives, product, sales, engineering, and client-facing stakeholders.
Experience operating autonomously on advanced, ambiguous, and high-risk technical challenges without relying on formal people-management authority
Bachelor’s degree in computer science, information systems, engineering, or a related field, or equivalent relevant experience.

Nice To Haves

Experience leading the architecture and engineering direction for a major transformation, platform modernization, or multi-year strategic program.
Advanced degree or relevant enterprise architecture, cloud, infrastructure, security, or technology certification.
Enterprise Architecture and System Implementation / Integration
Strategic Thinking and Strategic Planning & Execution
Influence Without Authority and Stakeholder Management
Communication, Storytelling & Presentation Skills
Cloud Platforms, Data Fluency, Cybersecurity, and Technical Writing & Documentation

Responsibilities

Define and evolve the technical vision, architecture strategy, and roadmap for major initiatives in alignment with business objectives.
Lead the engineering and architecture direction for large-scale projects as a hands-on individual contributor, making and documenting high-impact technical decisions.
Design secure, resilient, scalable, and integrated enterprise solutions across infrastructure, applications, data, networks, and cloud platforms.
Translate business goals, client needs, and product requirements into understandable architecture options, technical specifications, and implementation guidance.
Communicate complex technical concepts to product, sales, leadership, executives, clients, and engineering teams using language appropriate to each audience.
Partner across functions to build alignment on architecture priorities, tradeoffs, sequencing, dependencies, risks, and investment decisions.
Evaluate current-state capabilities, emerging technologies, and solution alternatives to identify gaps and recommend sustainable future-state approaches.
Establish architecture standards and patterns for the responsible integration of AI capabilities across NCC products
Establish and promote architecture principles, standards, patterns, documentation, and governance that support consistent delivery and long-term maintainability.
Guide complex integrations and major solution rollouts to ensure compatibility, security, performance, scalability, and alignment with the target architecture.
Provide technical mentorship and thought leadership to engineers and partners while influencing without formal authority or direct reports.