Tech Lead / Solution Architect

ShyftLabs • Toronto, ON

2d • $130,000 - $170,000 • Hybrid

About The Position

We're looking for a Tech Lead / Solution Architect who can operate as both a hands-on builder and a trusted technical partner to clients. This is a hybrid leadership role spanning architecture, delivery, and stakeholder engagement, you'll design and ship solutions across cloud, data, and application layers while coordinating engineering teams, vendors, and client stakeholders to keep delivery on track. You'll be embedded with Fortune 500 clients on programs that span data platforms, analytics, AI-enabled systems, and modern application stacks. Expect to move fluidly between whiteboarding architecture in the morning, writing SQL or reviewing infrastructure code in the afternoon, and walking a client through a delivery plan or risk tradeoff later that day.

Requirements

• 7+ years of software/data engineering experience, including 3+ years in a tech lead, solution architect, or delivery lead role.
• Cloud-agnostic experience, production-grade design and delivery across at least two of GCP, AWS, and Azure, including networking, identity, compute, managed data services, and CI/CD.
• Strong data engineering, SQL fluency (window functions, CTEs, hierarchical queries), experience with one or more of BigQuery, Databricks, Snowflake, or ClickHouse, and familiarity with batch and streaming pipelines (Kafka or equivalent).
• Comfort across multiple application stacks (e.g., Node.js, Python, Java, .NET), you don't need to be expert in all of them, but you should be able to read code and reason about design in more than one.
• Track record of leading client-facing delivery: scoping, estimation, resource and budget planning, and stakeholder communication.
• Experience leading architecture review and enterprise governance forums (ARB, InfoSec, security/compliance).
• Excellent written communication, concise, warm, and professional. Comfortable drafting status updates, scoping docs, and architecture decisions for mixed technical and business audiences.
• A startup mindset: adaptable, execution-focused, comfortable owning ambiguity end-to-end.

Nice To Haves

• Experience designing high-throughput, low-latency distributed systems, real-time analytics, event-driven platforms, or high-traffic API/microservice architectures.
• Hands-on experience with AI/LLM integrations, RAG systems, or agentic/MCP-style architectures in production.
• Familiarity with Microsoft data stack (SQL Server, Azure SQL, Azure DevOps) alongside modern lakehouse tools.
• Prior experience working with Fortune 500 enterprise clients in a consulting or product-services model.

Responsibilities

• Design end-to-end solutions spanning data pipelines, application services, and cloud infrastructure across major public clouds (GCP, AWS, Azure).
• Make architecture decisions on data warehousing (BigQuery, Databricks, Snowflake, ClickHouse), event/streaming layers (Kafka), API design, and cloud networking (DNS, CDN, WAF, identity, load balancing).
• Lead architecture review and enterprise governance processes.
• Produce architecture diagrams, data flow diagrams, integration specs, and decision records that engineering and client teams can actually use.
• Own technical delivery for client engagements: scoping, estimation, resource planning, risk tracking, and milestone management.
• Build and maintain capacity plans and budget models across development, onboarding, and support streams; surface tradeoffs clearly to leadership and clients.
• Translate ambiguous business asks into structured workstreams with clear ownership and dependencies.
• Write production-quality code and SQL when needed, this role is not purely advisory. Expect to debug a BigQuery or Databricks query, fix a CI pipeline, set up cloud networking, or unblock a deployment.
• Run proofs of concept to validate architectural approaches, including AI/LLM integrations, RAG patterns, and data pipeline designs, before committing the team.
• Review code, designs, and infrastructure changes; set the bar for engineering quality.
• Act as a senior technical voice in client meetings, explaining decisions, defending tradeoffs, and pushing back constructively when scope or assumptions need to change.
• Coordinate with external vendors, consultants, and client-side engineering, product, and security teams.
• Communicate concisely in writing and on calls; tailor depth and tone to the audience.
• Guide engineers through architectural decisions and design reviews.
• Coordinate across globally distributed teams and time zones (Toronto, India).
• Champion best practices around code quality, testing, observability, and documentation.

Benefits

• Hybrid Flexibility: Enjoy a hybrid model with three days per week in our Toronto office.
• Downtown Toronto Office: Work in the heart of the city.
• Comprehensive Benefits: We cover 100% of health, dental, and vision insurance premiums for you and your dependents which means no out-of-pocket costs. Eligibility starts from day one itself.
• Growth & Learning: Access extensive learning and development resources to keep leveling up your skills.

What This Job Offers

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