Principal Architect

Title: Principal Architect

Location: Birmingham, AL

Position Summary: 

We currently have an exciting opportunity for Principal Architect - Cloud, responsible for working with stakeholders, both leadership and subject matter experts, to develop Cloud Strategy, Architecture and Governance, to support Business strategy.This individual will utilize knowledge and technical expertise to define and develop Architectural frameworks, Standards, Governance framework and Reference Architectures, that accelerate business value delivery, enable long-term sustainability, and optimize costs.  

 
Key Accountabilities:  

• Develop, maintain, promote, and evangelize an enterprise Cloud Strategy and frameworks for the organization.
• Align the Cloud Architecture with the Company’s business objectives and IT Strategy.
• Provide strategic consultation in designing cloud-based solutions, functions, and organizational structures.
• Transition traditional Data Center centric processes and frameworks to Cloud based technologies.
• Analyze the current Cloud platforms (Azure) to detect critical deficiencies, recommend solutions and develop roadmap for improvement.
• Develop a roadmap to establish and mature Cloud Architectural Standards (Azure) and Governance (Financial, Technical and Security).
• Collaborate and liaison with Optum Technology team (HCC, EIS, EA) to establish a good working relationship.
• Support development of business case and cost benefit analysis, while reducing risk for cloud adaptation.
• Orchestrate, design, and architect solutions that leverage the existing investments made in current cloud technologies.
• Present ideas with qualitative and quantitative findings.
• Articulate technology solutions and analytical findings to Executive Management, Business leadership, Technical SMEs, and end users.
• Establish standards and processes for Cloud Platforms (Azure) to achieve quality, performance, cost optimization and security requirements.
• Build relationships with Infrastructure, Application Development and Data Engineering teams to gain an understanding of workloads and required functionality.

Skills/Abilities/Experience & Qualifications: 

• Bachelor’s degree or equivalent work experience. 
• 12 - 15+ years of experience with Architecture, Data, Infrastructure and Cloud support in Microsoft Technologies (Azure, SQL Server etc.).
• 5+ years of experience working in Azure Cloud Architect or technical leadership capacity, most recent role included.
• Solid understanding of Azure Architecture frameworks, Cloud Governance (MS Azure) and with the ability to provide trusted voice at the decision-making table.
• Solid understanding of various Azure components and their inter dependencies, including Infrastructure, Data, Application Services, Storage, Compute, Networking and Security. 
• Ability to balance value and risk.
• Expertise with IaaS and PaaS.
• Experience with DevOps, CI-CD, ITSM. 
• Experience and understanding of Windows, Linux and Cloud platforms.
• Thorough understanding of Azure based Systems Integration, Networking, Security, SOA and Financial Governance.
• Strong background in risk management methodologies as they relate to Cloud workloads.
• Strong knowledge of Azure based best practices and methodologies, to identify performance bottle necks, single points of failure and security risks.
• Excellent design pattern skills and willingness to assume total ownership of technology solutions from inception to delivery.
• Fluency in modern-day IT management concepts, including strategic planning, enterprise architecture, capital planning, cloud computing, and IT portfolio management. 
• Experience in creating an effective framework and process model for establishing enterprise-wide Cloud Architecture. 
• Ability and willingness to document Cloud Architecture, integrations and dependencies for existing platforms and systems.
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