Principal Architect, Interoperability - | Prairie, |

Join Optum Tech

Optum Tech is a global leader in health care innovation. Our teams develop cutting-edge solutions that help people live healthier lives and help make the health system work better for everyone. From advanced data analytics and AI to cybersecurity, we use innovative approaches to solve some of health care's most complex challenges. Your contributions here have the potential to change lives. Ready to build the next breakthrough? Join us to start Caring. Connecting. Growing together.

You'll enjoy the flexibility to work remotely from anywhere within the U.S. as you take on some tough challenges. For all hires in the Minneapolis or Washington, D.C. area, you will be required to work in the office a minimum of four days per week.

Primary Responsibilities

• Lead HL7 FHIR event participation: Review and prioritize HL7 FHIR Connectathon tracks aligned to UHC/Optum business needs, products, and interoperability roadmap
• Stakeholder alignment: Meet with UHC/Optum HL7 voting members, HL7 Work Group (WG) participants, and the Interoperability Community of Practice (CoP) to vet proposed tracks and identify the teams/solutions that would benefit from participation
• Outreach & engagement: Proactively reach out to identified UHC/Optum teams and solution owners to socialize relevant tracks, assess interest and readiness, and secure participation commitments
• Preparation & coordination: Attend pre-Connectathon track meetings; coordinate logistics, test data, sandbox access, scope, and timelines for UHC/Optum teams; ensure prerequisites (SMART App Launch, CDS Hooks, Bulk Data) are in place for successful testing.
• Infrastructure readiness: Partner with security, platform, and DevOps teams to stand up and manage publicly accessible testing environments, addressing privacy, compliance, risk, and monitoring requirements
• Onsite facilitation: Attend the Connectathon; guide team testing activities, triage issues, capture results, and drive follow-ups with track leads and HL7 WGs
• Technical stewardship: Provide hands-on guidance for implementing FHIR-based applications and services; ensure alignment with standards (RESTful APIs, OAuth 2.0 /SMART) and best practices
• Results & continuous improvement: Document lessons learned, interoperability gaps, and recommendations; translate outcomes into actionable backlogs, standards updates, and product roadmaps
• External collaboration: Maintain relationships with HL7 WGs, track leads, and ecosystem partners; represent UHC/Optum interests and promote interoperability advancements

You'll be rewarded and recognized for your performance in an environment that will challenge you and give you clear direction on what it takes to succeed in your role as well as provide development for other roles you may be interested in.

Required Qualifications

• Solid Understanding of FHIR Standards
  • Hands-on experience with FHIR-based functionalities such as CDS Hooks, SMART App Launch, and FHIR Bulk Data (Flat FHIR/NDJSON)
  • Proven experience developing FHIR-based applications and/or FHIR services, including implementation, testing, and deployment
  • Demonstrated understanding and practical experience with the HL7 FHIR Standard (resources, profiles, operations) and related technologies: RESTful FHIR APIs and OAuth 2.0 (including SMART App Launch)
• Technical Skills
  • Experience setting up and operating publicly accessible testing environments, with solid awareness of privacy, security, and compliance considerations (e.g. risk assessment, data minimization, secure configuration, monitoring)
  • Demonstrated ability to set up FHIR servers, test endpoints and use tools like Postman or Touchstone
  • Proven skills mapping legacy data to FHIR resources.
  • Connectathon Process Knowledge
  • Understanding how Connectathons work-tracks, testing scenarios, and reporting.
  • Familiarity with HL7 community processes (e.g., Connectathons, Work Groups, ballots) and the ability to translate event outcomes into organizational value
  • Familiarity with HL7 registration, test scripts, and sandbox environments
  • Demonstrated ability to identify tracks relevant to UHG goals
• Facilitation and Leadership Skills
  • Demonstrated ability to coordinate multi-team participation across product, engineering, security, and standards/governance groups; solid facilitation, communication, and stakeholder management skills
  • Demonstrated ability to explain technical concepts to non-technical stakeholders
  • Proven solid analytical and problem-solving skills; ability to synthesize complex technical details into clear actions and artifacts

Preferred Qualifications

• Experience participating in or leading HL7 FHIR Connectathon tracks and collaborating with HL7 WG leads
• Experience working within large enterprises (e.g., matrixed orgs like UHC/Optum) to drive cross-functional outcomes
• Experience to contributions to standards, implementation guides, or community artifacts (e.g., track proposals, IG feedback, reference implementations)
• Understanding of clinical data exchange, terminology standards (SNOMED-CT, LOINC, ICD-10) and regulatory requirements
• Awareness of common FHIR use cases like patient access, clinical decision support, and EHR integration
• Knowledge of healthcare data and interoperability domains (e.g., clinical workflows, payer/provider use cases, prior authorization, quality measurement)
• Exposure to security and privacy frameworks relevant to healthcare (e.g., HIPAA), and practices such as threat modeling, secure SDLC, and zero-trust principles
• Familiarity with DevOps/SRE practices and tooling (CI/CD, API gateways, observability) used to operate FHIR services at scale

*All employees working remotely will be required to adhere to UnitedHealth Group's Telecommuter Policy

Pay is based on several factors including but not limited to local labor markets, education, work experience, certifications, etc. In addition to your salary, we offer benefits such as, a comprehensive benefits package, incentive and recognition programs, equity stock purchase and 401k contribution (all benefits are subject to eligibility requirements). No matter where or when you begin a career with us, you'll find a far-reaching choice of benefits and incentives. The salary for this role will range from $134,600 to $230,800 annually based on full-time employment. We comply with all minimum wage laws as applicable.

Application Deadline: This will be posted for a minimum of 2 business days or until a sufficient candidate pool has been collected. Job posting may come down early due to volume of applicants.

At UnitedHealth Group, our mission is to help people live healthier lives and make the health system work better for everyone. We believe everyone-of every race, gender, sexuality, age, location and income-deserves the opportunity to live their healthiest life. Today, however, there are still far too many barriers to good health which are disproportionately experienced by people of color, historically marginalized groups and those with lower incomes. We are committed to mitigating our impact on the environment and enabling and delivering equitable care that addresses health disparities and improves health outcomes - an enterprise priority reflected in our mission.

UnitedHealth Group is an Equal Employment Opportunity employer under applicable law and qualified applicants will receive consideration for employment without regard to race, national origin, religion, age, color, sex, sexual orientation, gender identity, disability, or protected veteran status, or any other characteristic protected by local, state, or federal laws, rules, or regulations.

UnitedHealth Group is a drug - free workplace. Candidates are required to pass a drug test before beginning employment.