Principal Systems Architect - Marketing Technology

Caterpillar•Chicago, IL

About The Position

Career Area: Technology, Digital and Data Job Description: Your Work Shapes the World at Caterpillar Inc. When you join Caterpillar, you're joining a global team who cares not just about the work we do – but also about each other. We are the makers, problem solvers, and future world builders who are creating stronger, more sustainable communities. We don't just talk about progress and innovation here – we make it happen, with our customers, where we work and live. Together, we are building a better world, so we can all enjoy living in it. Cat Digital is the digital and technology arm of Caterpillar Inc., leveraging the latest technologies to build industry leading digital solutions for our customers and dealers. With over 1.5 million connected assets worldwide, our teams use data, technology, advanced analytics, telematics and AI capabilities to help our customers build a better, more sustainable world. Job Summary: The Principal Systems Architect is the architecture leader for digital marketing technology. The role establishes the target-state vision and executable roadmap for an integrated, secure, scalable and measurable MarTech ecosystem spanning content creation, asset management, product information, web experience delivery, analytics, social and omnichannel activation. The role designs scalable MarTech architectures, leads content management and personalization initiatives, defines integration and data-governance strategies, and partners with business and marketing teams to deliver digital transformation and measurable business value.

Requirements

Analytical Thinking: Knowledge of techniques and tools that promote effective analysis; ability to determine the root cause of organizational problems and create alternative solutions that resolve these problems.
Effective Communications: Understanding of effective communication concepts, tools and techniques; ability to effectively transmit, receive, and accurately interpret ideas, information, and needs through the application of appropriate communication behaviors.
Application Design, Architecture: Knowledge of basic activities and deliverables of application design; ability to utilize application design methodologies, tools and techniques to convert business requirements and logical models into a technical application design.
Data Architecture: Knowledge of processes, techniques and factors that affect data architecture; ability to design blueprints on how to integrate data resources for business processes and functional support.
Platform Architecture: Knowledge of technologies and methods to design processing mechanisms and roadmaps to execute business application systems; ability to design these roadmaps and deploy supportive interfaces for end-users to access related systems, in accordance with standards and processes.
Requirements Analysis: Knowledge of tools, methods, and techniques of requirement analysis; ability to elicit, analyze and record required business functionality and non-functionality requirements to ensure the success of a system or software development project.
Target Architecture: Knowledge of target architecture; ability to develop the IT blueprint and roadmap while aligning the architecture and processes with business strategies and objectives roadmap while aligning the architecture and processes with business strategies and objectives

Nice To Haves

Extensive IT and MarTech experience, including senior architecture leadership and full-lifecycle delivery of complex, global digital transformation programs.
A degree in computer science, information systems or a related field, or equivalent experience; architecture and platform certifications are advantageous.
Deep enterprise DXP experience with AEM, Contentful, Uniform or similar platforms, including headless and composable delivery models.
Production experience with React/Next.js or comparable web stacks, server rendering, edge platforms/CDNs, caching, redirects, accessibility, SEO and web performance.
Strong working knowledge of Adobe Experience Cloud and adjacent content tools, especially Adobe Experience Manager Sites and Assets, Creative Cloud workflows and Adobe Workfront; familiarity with Google Analytics, Adobe Analytics, Target, Experience Platform/Real-Time CDP and Journey Optimizer is highly valuable.
Architecture experience across enterprise PIM (such as Informatica and Akeneo PIM) and commerce platforms, DAM/CDN and media platforms (such as Adobe Dynamic Media/Scene7 and CatDV), social platforms, analytics/BI and customer-facing web ecosystems.
Expertise in marketing, advertising, personalization, experimentation, customer data platforms, data orchestration, content strategy and omnichannel activation.
Demonstrated success simplifying fragmented content and data flows, integrating legacy and modern platforms, and moving organizations from manual handoffs toward governed, AI-enabled automation.
Experience with structured content and DITA, and with B2B manufacturing, industrial, dealer/distributor or similarly complex global ecosystems.
Strong integration fundamentals, including REST APIs, webhooks, OAuth/OIDC, SAML, event-driven and durable asynchronous processing, idempotency, reconciliation and data-contract design.
Cloud fluency (AWS, Azure or equivalent), including serverless compute, secrets management, observability, resilience, security, privacy and cost control.
Modern delivery practices: Agile and full SDLC, architecture-as-code/documentation, automated testing, CI/CD, environment strategy, release governance and vendor/platform lifecycle management.
Practical knowledge of privacy-by-design, consent management, identity resolution, data governance and responsible AI-enabled personalization.
A record of mentoring technical talent, directing partners and vendors, and converting architecture strategy into prioritized investment decisions and measurable outcomes.

Responsibilities

Own the current-state, transition and target-state architecture and multiyear roadmap across digital marketing technology ecosystem.
Develop detailed architecture deliverables to solve business problems, translating functional and non-functional requirements into application, platform, integration and data designs.
Design technical infrastructure including databases, programming languages, utilities and testing approaches and lead evaluation and deployment of technologies that add or enhance digital capabilities.
Partner with business, product, marketing, data, security and engineering teams to address requirements and deliver digital solutions that meet business results.
Assess the marketing technology ecosystem, identify capability and performance gaps, document architecture decisions, and recommend solution patterns and best practices aligned with business objectives.
Define platform strategy from MVP through implementation, maintenance, consolidation and deprecation.
Architect end-to-end content supply chains for image, video and product/specification content from Adobe Creative Cloud, agencies and source systems through Assets, Sites, PIM, commerce and external channels, reducing manual handoffs and duplicate stores.
Design data-layer contracts, tagging standards, consent gating, identity and audience flows, API/event integrations, metadata and data-quality controls that enable reliable measurement and personalized omnichannel experiences.
Lead architecture reviews, technical discovery and requirements walkthroughs; quantify cost, benefit, risk and likelihood of success; resolve complex design issues and maintain traceability to business outcomes.
Provide technical direction to delivery teams and partners, coach architects and engineers, and communicate recommendations effectively to executives, practitioners