Senior Director, Head of Enterprise Architecture

Flywire • Chicago, IL

9d • $181,180 - $258,828

About The Position

Flywire is seeking a Head of Architecture to serve as a strategic technical partner to the Chief Technology Officer and lead the evolution of its enterprise architecture. The role defines the long-term architecture strategy for Flywire’s global payments platform and ensures its technology ecosystem can scale as the company grows.

The position establishes architecture standards, guides major platform decisions, and drives modernization across Flywire’s technology stack. It partners closely with engineering leadership, product, infrastructure, and security teams to align technology direction, goals, and roadmaps. The role also builds and mentors a small team of domain and platform architects, advises the CTO on technology investments, and supports technical due diligence for mergers, acquisitions, and strategic partnerships. The ideal candidate is an experienced enterprise architect with a hands-on approach when needed, an AI-first mindset, and a record of building global platforms in complex distributed environments.

The position is open to candidates in Chicago, Illinois, or Austin, Texas. The posted base salary range is $181,180–$258,828; individual pay depends on location and factors including skills, experience, education, and training.

Requirements

• 15+ years of experience in software engineering and architecture leadership roles.
• Proven experience as an Enterprise Architect, Chief Architect, or Distinguished Engineer in large-scale technology environments.
• Deep expertise designing highly scalable distributed systems and cloud-native architectures.
• Experience building architecture strategies for global platforms handling high-volume transaction workloads.
• Strong background in microservices architectures, APIs, and event-driven systems.
• Experience operating in complex regulated industries such as fintech, payments, or financial services.
• Demonstrated ability to influence engineering organizations and drive architectural standards across distributed teams.
• Strong collaboration skills and ability to partner across engineering, product, and executive leadership.
• Strong communication skills and ability to represent and advocate for technology matters across the company, including with the C-suite.
• Experience leading architecture initiatives within global engineering organizations.

Responsibilities

• Define and maintain the enterprise architecture strategy for Flywire’s global payments platform and software solutions.
• Establish architecture standards across application, platform, data, and infrastructure layers.
• Drive architectural alignment and promote technical excellence and architectural discipline across globally distributed engineering teams.
• Build and mentor a small team of domain and platform architects.
• Lead initiatives to modernize and rationalize legacy systems and evolve the common platform architecture.
• Guide adoption of modern architecture patterns, including microservices, cloud-native infrastructure, and distributed systems.
• Establish architecture governance frameworks, including architecture review boards and design standards.
• Ensure architectural decisions support long-term scalability, security, and compliance while containing or reducing technical debt.
• Advise the CTO on technology investment decisions and platform evolution.
• Evaluate emerging technologies and guide adoption of innovations that improve engineering velocity and platform capabilities.
• Lead technical due diligence for mergers and acquisitions and strategic partnerships.
• Partner with engineering, product, infrastructure, and security teams to ensure architectural alignment.
• Work with global engineering teams across multiple regions to drive consistent architecture standards.

Benefits

• Competitive compensation
• Employee Stock Purchase Plan (ESPP)
• Competitive time off
• Wellbeing programs, including mental health, wellness, and Yoga/Pilates/HIIT classes
• Talent and development programs, including Managers Taking Flight and OneFlywire Career Mobility

What This Job Offers

• Job Type: Full-time
• Career Level: Senior
• Education Level: No Education Listed