Principal Full Stack Architect

Principal Full Stack Architect

DEPARTMENT OVERVIEW

This Technical Expert Architect will be supporting our Insurance Platform and business as part of the broader Architecture Practice department. This is the top independent contributor role accountable for proactive top-tier technical advice to leadership, and architectural target states required to enable business growth and outcomes. The Architect will guide but rise above the day-to-day product delivery to bring exceptional forward looking technical thought leadership and advice to Insurance technology executives, driving target states and proactively influencing the medium- and longer-term technical roadmaps. Deep technical expertise, combined with organizational savvy, Insurance industry knowledge, expert communications, influencing and partnership skills are critical to the success of this role.

CUSTOMER

• Play a key role in aligning internal and external stakeholders on the architecture / infrastructure aspects of the product strategy and delivery roadmap, communicating with and actively engaging with the Executive Platform Owner in achieving the strategy.
• Identify and define architectural boulders required for the segment and lead the architecture backlog prioritization activities, advising on business / technology trade-offs
• Review, approve / veto delivery blueprints relative to segment target state and enterprise standards. Advise on how best to design overall solutions
• Identify, recommend, source, negotiate and implement emerging end-to-end IT trends, developments and improvements / solutions (buy / build / reuse) through leadership of projects and contributing to segment-specific leadership committee insights focusing on overall operational steering for architecture
• Collaborate broadly with other practitioners, from marketing teams to engineers, to ensure the right look and necessary features for the products / projects and applications within assigned portfolio. Actively engages with the Practice on upskilling and building team capability.
• Steer the process and connect partners in the creation of consumable assets that leverage and integrate proven reference architecture designs and patterns to select from many methodologies. Steer the team beyond the theoretical in order to get the architecture tested and into production.
• Hold decision rights on Architecture-specific strategies and owns policies, roles and responsibilities within assigned Platform for the technology roadmap to ensure alignment with enterprise guidelines now and as the design evolves to meet future needs
• Oversee and advise on the design of technology applications and/or infrastructure on high profile, complex and/or high-risk technology projects with significant impact to the organization, playing an active role in the process of developing, customizing and integrating systems
• Drive continual upgrading based on an integrated perspective on existing gaps and opportunities for service / system development across the technology stacks and grounds the team in assessing practical concerns to evolve features
• An independent contributor but influences through effective collaboration, negotiation, coaching of emerging technical skills / trends across the team and practice

SHAREHOLDER

• Focus on reliability, scalability, and the development of the architectural infrastructure, including highly complex and scalable systems
• Develops observability standards to ensure that production systems operate under known conditions and transparently provides these measurements to anticipate when errors or failures can arise
• Lead interaction with governance and control groups, (e.g. regulatory / operational risk, compliance and audit) to provide subject matter expertise and consult on risk issues related to architectural technology and tools
• Lead or contribute to cross-functional / enterprise initiatives as an organizational or subject matter expert helping to identify risk / provide guidance for significant and complex situations
• Monitor and report on the status of the products / projects and applications within assigned product, ensuring projects are compliant with technology domain architecture, and designs / operates processes to provide ongoing review of in-progress activity against technology architecture and development standards
• Foresee architectural issues / gaps and identify emerging industry trends to recommend value-added architectural improvements that will alleviate technology debt, build resilient solutions and unlock business value
• Maps processes and sub-processes that bridge the gap between business problems and technology solutions
• Collaborates within practices, platforms or journeys comprised of diverse and complementary skills; inspiring the team to embrace change and continually advance collective knowledge of technical tools / trends / capabilities
• Protect the interests of the organization - identify and manage risks, and escalate non-standard, high-risk activities as necessary
• Keep abreast of emerging issues, trends, and evolving regulatory requirements and assess potential impacts
• Maintain a culture of risk management and control, supported by effective processes in alignment with risk appetite

EMPLOYEE / TEAM

• Participate fully as a member of the team, support a positive work environment that promotes service to the business, quality, innovation and teamwork and ensure timely communication of issues/ points of interest
• Provide thought leadership and/ or industry knowledge for architectural best practices and participate in knowledge transfer within the team and business unit
• Keep current on emerging industry trends/ developments both from technical and business perspective, and grow knowledge of the business, related tools, technologies and techniques
• Participate in personal performance management and development activities, including cross training within own team
• Keep others informed and up-to-date about the status / progress of key initiatives and / or all relevant or useful information related to day-to-day activities
• Contribute to team development of skills and capabilities through mentorship of others, by sharing knowledge and experiences and leveraging best practices
• Contribute to the growth of architecture practice overall by owning and evolving a technical domain on behalf of the practice, presenting technical topics at townhalls and lunch & learns, actively participating at Architecture Review Boards, and guiding practitioners on best practices
• Work collaboratively with the team and leadership to proactively identify and resolve issues related to product quality
• Lead, motivate and develop relationships with internal and external business partners / stakeholders to develop productive working relationships.
• Contribute to a fair, positive and equitable environment that supports a diverse workforce
• Act as a brand ambassador for your business area/function and the bank, both internally and/or externally

BREADTH & DEPTH

In addition to standard L11 breadth and depth factors, the following criteria must be met:

• Top technical individual contributor role with accountability to guide technology direction and selection through expert knowledge of the catalogue of technology stacks and practices associated with platforms, programming, languages and tools, as well as advanced business acumen and understanding of broader organization issues and relevant technology
• Accountable for the overall Architecture portfolio, roadmap and definition in the product-based org for their respective platform
• Responsible for strategic decisions for the Architecture practice within a platform, escalating as appropriate
• Sets collaboration framework and creates solution prototypes for providing Architecture advice and guidance to the product-based org
• Controls solution and development, regulatory and compliance for complex system landscapes (e.g., hybrid, multi-cloud, edge workloads)
• Typically reports to the Architecture practice executive

EXPERIENCE & EDUCATION

• Undergraduate degree or Technical Certificate (Graduate degree preferred)
• 15+ years relevant technical and architecture experience developing a variety of platforms in large Insurance or Financial Services organizations
• Minimum 5 years' experience in a senior solution architecture or enterprise architecture role
• Expert problem solving, technical, strategic thinking skills, and deep specialization in one or more technical areas, with deep understanding of industry standards, advanced technologies, and methodologies
• Demonstrated history of being a senior technical advisor to executives with significant strategic impact including driving proactive innovation across one or more business segments
• Exceptional communications skills, written and verbal, with extensive experience of publishing and presenting materials to technical and non-technical stakeholders at all levels including technical strategies, whitepapers, architectural patterns
• Experience evaluating new technologies, running prototypes and POCs, and proactively planning for emerging technologies
• Extensive experience designing, delivering or overseeing complex architectural systems with significant value to business, ensuring technical quality and strategic alignment
• History of taking initiative, driving and influencing segment-impacting technical decisions and strategies, working with minimal technical oversight
• History of technical mentorship, successfully collaborating across cross-functional teams within the segment and perhaps, at an industry level. Effective leadership by influence.
• Very good business acumen and understanding of the Insurance industry
• Knowledge of the Guidewire Suite is an asset
• Working experience with AWS and Azure clouds
• Knowledge of emerging AI capabilities with ability to assess and apply them to segment strategies