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Up to $150k/yr. yes relo available / no sponsorship available, hybrid schedule;
Description
The Solutions Architect Lead is a member of the eBusiness Center of Excellence (CoE) IT group and maintains the architecture (and related artifacts) for Commerce-focused applications and systems. The Solutions Architect is responsible for leading collaboration with Business and IT Stakeholders throughout the organization in order to design solution architectures that deliver the required business capabilities while being aligned to ITS’ business and technology strategies. This role specifically is responsible for the assets related to the Web and Ecommerce ecosystem of applications and systems.
This position translates business capabilities/requirements into specific business, application, information, and technology architectures to deliver business value. The incumbent will need to build relationships with key business and technology stakeholders across the enterprise; be highly collaborative; drive communication to the business, architecture, and software delivery teams; and apply analytical and problem-solving skills to help identify and solve systems problems.
An effective Solutions Architect will have a broad range of technical knowledge and will deliver solution architectures across multiple projects, as well as consultative technical leadership across the organization, from strategic decision making to project planning to architectural governance and oversight. This position will work closely with others to grow their base of knowledge, but also share their knowledge with the business and IT teams via collaborative meetings, documentation, and formal presentations.
Essential Functions
Strategy & Planning
Provide strategic, technical and operational expertise and leadership in support of business and technology transformational activities.
Contribute to technology strategy and planning; lead research on emerging technologies in support of systems development efforts; recommend introduction of technologies, new features, or other non-functional requirements for implementation that will increase cost effectiveness and systems flexibility.
Develop and foster relationships with the divisional and business unit subject matter experts.
Confer with stakeholders to define business requirements for complex systems development from both functional and non-functional perspectives (i.e. concept of operations, performance, test, cost, schedule, training, support and disposal).
Promote synergies and reuse within projects across the CoE in order to maximize rapid yet responsible delivery of business value, as well as championing architectural principles and strategies.
Communicate the Solution Architectures to senior management, business, architecture, and development teams through deliverables, presentations, training and other appropriate means and forums.
Coach, mentor and support system development teams in implementing reference architectures and standards.
Steer CoE use of Integration, partnering with SOA CoE/Integration Competency Center to strategically suggest Services and Integrations to realize reliable business value.
Steer CoE use of Application Security, partnering with Application Security team to identify and support Delivery Teams’ realization of requirements in the security space.
Stay current on emerging design patterns, software development or infrastructure concepts and industry best practices.
Serve as a bridge between highly technical and highly business-focused teams, facilitating understanding and brokering agreements to shared goals through collaboration.
Acquisition & Deployment
Provide technical oversight for multiple project initiatives.
Lead technology life-cycle projects including technology evaluation, selection, implementation, support and retirement/replacement.
Evaluate alternative architectures with respect to their feasibility as well as composition (people, hardware, software, facilities, policies, documents, risks and cost), and make recommendations.
Develop prototypes of system designs, working with Technical Architects and Delivery Teams, to prove viability where necessary.
Operational Management
Assist in the creation of enterprise-wide technology standards.
Document architectural designs and standards for implemented solutions.
Create and maintain reference architectures, systems models, use case scenarios, workflow diagrams, and data models to provide architectural expertise, direction, and guidance to IT delivery teams.
Validate the architecture’s compliance to the requirements and verify the system’s compliance to the architecture.
Develop, document, communicate, and enforce system standards and solutions review processes.
Mentor and/or provide guidance to all members of the team.
Support risk identification and mitigation process and provide issue management. Provide recommendations as required.
Incidental Functions
Assist with other projects as may be required to contribute to the efficiency and effectiveness of the group and other business/technical entities.
Participate in hiring activities and fulfilling affirmative action obligations and ensuring compliance with the equal employment opportunity policy.
Minimal travel, up to 5% may be required.
Work outside the standard office 7.5 hour workday may be required.
Position Requirements
Formal Education & Certification
Bachelor’s Degree or foreign equivalent in related field or equivalent experience.
Master’s Degree preferred.
Professional training and/or certifications using Oracle, IBM, HCL, and Microsoft tools and technologies is a plus.
Knowledge & Experience
12+ years IT experience.
8+ years experience designing, developing, implementing middle-tier and distributed systems.
6+ years experience in enterprise and/or solutions architecture and architectural frameworks.
Experience designing and developing solutions on IBM WebSphere Commerce/HCL Commerce.
Strong working knowledge of architecture with the ability to analyze and resolve moderately complex, cross-system issues, and demonstrate an understanding of specific technologies (and their architectural connectivity).
Experience in developing strategic solutions architecture plans, technology planning and execution, and policy development and maintenance.
Knowledge of information processing, data modeling principles, data management practices, and system interaction patterns and interfaces.
Demonstrated ability to analyze existing technical architectures and recommend and implement alternatives with regard to tools, technologies, and approaches to their use.
Experience with virtualization, cloud computing, or container technologies.
Knowledge of vendor software integration and interaction patterns.
Knowledge of COTS evaluation principles and practices.
Preferred Attributes
Experience with Search and Merchandising (Solr, Elasticsearch, or similar).
Experience with Content Management (Adobe AEM, or similar).
Experience with Order Management (IBM Sterling OMS, or similar).
Experience with Product Information Management / Master Data Management (Stibo STEP, or similar).
Experience with various key business and operational activities of a manufacturing and retail enterprise, including Sales and Marketing, Product Development, Identity and Access Management, Financial Processing, or Digital Workplace Management.
Experience with defining, utilizing, and guiding the appropriate use of various data integration techniques (ETL, EAI, EII), including understanding the components within, capabilities of, and appropriate “fit to purpose ” of Service Bus and Microservices Architectures.
Experience with practices governing definition and design of Services and RESTful APIs.
Knowledge of various legal and regulatory obligations such as PCI, SOX, HIPAA, or similar standards a plus.
Knowledge of common testing methodologies, terminology and industry standards a plus.
Certification or experience with enterprise architecture methodologies and frameworks, such as TOGAF, Zachman, or FEAF, is a plus.
Personal Attributes
Excellent analytical, conceptual, and problem-solving abilities.
Exceptional ability and initiative to learn and research new concepts, ideas, and technologies quickly.
Ability to effectively partner with IT and Business to lead and influence best practice design.
Driven to challenge the existing processes, methods, products and services of the company.
Excellent written and oral communication, presentation, and interpersonal skills, and enjoys leveraging them.
Ability to see and articulate patterns and relationships between technologies, processes, business models, and people.
Strong ability to translate ideas and concepts to intended audiences.
Negotiation skills and ability to influence others by educating and sharing information.
Ability to prioritize and execute tasks independently.
Ability to work in a team-oriented, collaborative, multi-stakeholder, multi-location environment.
Strong ability to train and teach others.
Ability to facilitate meetings and follow up with resulting action items.
Ability to prioritize and execute tasks in a high-pressure environment.
Thrives in an environment of continuous change; strives to act as an agent of change.
Candidate must be eligible to work in the country for which they are applying for employment, without now or in the future needing sponsorship for employment work visa and/or permanent residence status.
