Enterprise Solutions Architect

Project: Enterprise Applications – Solution Architecture Services

Contract Duration: 10+ Months

Location: Seattle, WA

Job Summary

We are seeking an experienced Solution Architect to provide enterprise-level architecture leadership across business and IT initiatives. The consultant will be responsible for designing, planning, governing, and implementing scalable, secure, maintainable, and integrated technology solutions aligned with enterprise architecture standards and business objectives.

The ideal candidate will have strong experience in enterprise application architecture, cloud platforms, data architecture, system integrations, infrastructure, cybersecurity, and technology solution design.

The Solution Architect will work closely with business stakeholders, project managers, technical teams, service owners, engineers, and external vendors throughout the solution lifecycle.

Key Responsibilities

1. Business and Technical Discovery

• Conduct workshops with business and technical stakeholders to understand business requirements, capabilities, constraints, and objectives.
• Assess existing business processes, applications, integrations, and technology platforms.
• Review functional and non-functional requirements.
• Identify technical dependencies, assumptions, risks, and constraints.

2. Solution Architecture Design and Review

• Develop target-state solution architectures for enterprise projects and strategic initiatives.
• Create conceptual, logical, and physical architecture diagrams.
• Define application, integration, data, infrastructure, cloud, and security architecture components.
• Ensure alignment with enterprise architecture standards and technology roadmaps.
• Evaluate alternative solutions and recommend appropriate technology approaches.
• Participate in architecture review boards and governance committees.
• Review vendor and project solution designs.
• Identify technical debt and recommend remediation opportunities.
• Maintain architecture documentation and repositories.

3. Technology Evaluation and Recommendations

• Evaluate technology products, platforms, and vendor solutions.
• Participate in proof-of-concept (POC) evaluations.
• Prepare architecture decision records and technical recommendations.
• Support procurement activities, RFP evaluations, vendor demonstrations, and technical assessments.
• Conduct risk and trade-off analysis.

4. Enterprise Integration Architecture

• Design integrations across enterprise applications, cloud services, SaaS platforms, and on-premises systems.
• Define API, event-driven, batch, and data exchange integration patterns.
• Establish integration standards and best practices.
• Review vendor integration approaches and recommend improvements.

5. Data and Information Architecture

• Define data flows, data ownership, integration points, and data models.
• Ensure alignment with enterprise data governance standards.
• Collaborate with analytics, reporting, and data engineering teams.
• Support the development of conceptual, logical, canonical, and semantic data models.

6. Security and Compliance Architecture

• Collaborate with cybersecurity teams to incorporate security-by-design principles.
• Review identity and access management (IAM), encryption, logging, and monitoring requirements.
• Ensure solutions comply with organizational security, privacy, and regulatory requirements.

7. Project Delivery Support

• Provide technical leadership throughout the project lifecycle.
• Support requirements clarification, design reviews, testing, and deployment planning.
• Participate in production readiness reviews.
• Resolve architecture issues and technical blockers.
• Collaborate with project managers, developers, engineers, stakeholders, and vendors.

8. Operational Readiness and Transition

• Work with service owners to incorporate operational support requirements into solution designs.
• Ensure monitoring, alerting, backup, and disaster recovery considerations are addressed.
• Support service management, knowledge transfer, and operational handoff documentation.

Key Deliverables

• Solution Architecture Documentation and Architecture Decision Records.
• Application, Infrastructure, and System Integration Architecture Documents and Diagrams.
• Conceptual, Logical, and Physical Architecture Diagrams.
• Technical Evaluation Scorecards.
• Vendor Technical Assessments.
• Risk and Trade-off Analysis.
• API Specification Documentation.
• Data Architecture Documents and Data Flow Diagrams.
• Conceptual, Logical, Canonical, and Semantic Data Models.
• Security Architecture Reviews.
• Knowledge Transfer and Operational Handoff Documentation.

Required Technical Competencies

• Enterprise Solution Architecture.
• Enterprise Application Architecture.
• Cloud Architecture and Infrastructure.
• Data and Information Architecture.
• Enterprise Integration Architecture.
• API and Event-Driven Architecture.
• Database and Data Modelling.
• Cybersecurity and Security Architecture.
• Identity and Access Management.
• Architecture Governance and Design Reviews.
• Technology Evaluation and Vendor Assessments.
• Disaster Recovery and Operational Readiness.

Preferred Experience

• Experience designing and governing end-to-end enterprise technology solutions.
• Experience working with cross-functional business and technology teams.
• Experience developing architecture documentation and technical design artifacts.
• Experience evaluating vendor solutions and supporting RFP/procurement activities.
• Experience delivering enterprise IT projects and supporting production transitions.
• Ability to communicate complex technical concepts to business and technical stakeholders.