Senior Enterprise Infrastructure Architect

Overview At Banner Life Insurance Company, we lead with heart and ambition. Every day, we transform purpose into progress, guided by our unwavering commitment to be better for our customers, clients, and communities, not just today but long‑term as well. Our people are the driving force behind everything we achieve. Their passion, purpose, and pursuit of innovation empower us to deliver cutting‑edge solutions that support those we serve, ensuring we are here for you, here for good and striving for better. We're a forward‑thinking company energized by our work and how we show up for one another. Our culture is built on meaningful impact and genuine enjoyment, because we believe great work and great experiences should go hand in hand. By offering career development opportunities, comprehensive benefits, and programs that support your wellbeing, we help you thrive personally and professionally. We are here for you, here for good and here for better. Banner Life has experienced significant growth over the past several years, driven by digital transformation and platform‑led innovation. As we look ahead, we have an ambitious goal to more than triple our revenue over the next decade by expanding into new products, distribution channels, and customer experiences. Technology & Transformation plays a central role in enabling this growth. Our infrastructure strategy is evolving from traditional operations to a scalable, cloud‑enabled, intelligent, and resilient platform that can support exponential growth, security, and innovation. Within this context, Enterprise Infrastructure Architecture is a critical capability. This role defines the future‑state infrastructure architecture and ensures Network, Systems, Storage, Telecom, and Cloud capabilities evolve as an integrated platform, working closely with Cyber and Application Engineering rather than operating as disconnected technology domains. The Senior Enterprise Infrastructure Architect is responsible for defining, governing, and evolving Banner Life’s future‑state infrastructure architecture across cloud, network, systems, storage, telecom, identity, observability, resiliency, and automation domains. It also ensures infrastructure architecture anticipates business growth, increased digital transaction volumes, data growth, AI‑enabled workloads, and new product and distribution capabilities. The architect acts as the connective tissue across infrastructure domains, ensuring that modernization initiatives, platform roadmaps, standards, and major design decisions align to enterprise architecture, cyber security expectations, operational resilience, and long‑term business scale. In alignment with the Infrastructure RUN vs CHANGE operating model, this role is primarily accountable for the CHANGE / TRANSFORM architecture agenda. Managed service partners own day‑to‑day RUN execution, while this role defines the future‑state architecture, engineering guardrails, and operational readiness criteria needed to ensure platforms are scalable, secure, supportable, and ready for operational handoff. Responsibilities Architecture & Strategy Provide architectural direction and alignment across Senior Network, Systems, Storage, and Telecom Engineers to ensure domain roadmaps integrate into a cohesive enterprise infrastructure strategy. Partner with domain engineering leads to define “what good looks like” across infrastructure capabilities, including reference architectures, standards, patterns, and lifecycle roadmaps. Treat infrastructure capabilities as enterprise platforms, enabling reusable, scalable, secure, and standardized services across applications, data, business operations, and customer‑facing capabilities. Ensure infrastructure strategy supports enterprise growth, resilience, security, customer experience, and operational scalability. Develop and maintain current‑state, transition‑state, and target‑state infrastructure architecture documentation, including logical, physical, cloud, resiliency, and integration models. Define and maintain the hybrid cloud reference architecture covering identity, networking, security, management, and resiliency across on‑premises and cloud environments. Evaluate emerging technologies (cloud, AI, automation, security tools) for adoption within the insurance environment. Provide technical leadership across domains including cloud computing, data centers, networks, storage, virtualization, and security infrastructure. Collaborate with platform engineering, infrastructure, security, and application teams to translate business and technical requirements into end‑to‑end architectural solutions. Embed Zero Trust and identity‑first design principles into all architectures, partnering closely with security and identity Infrastructure Design & Transformation Provide architecture leadership for infrastructure modernization initiatives, including cloud migration, data center optimization, disaster recovery planning, infrastructure automation, and network transformation. Design scalable, resilient, and secure infrastructure solutions across on‑premises, cloud (AWS/Azure), and hybrid models. Design landing zones, connectivity patterns, and shared services that enable secure and scalable adoption of cloud platforms. Lead or support the design of workload migration strategies (rehost, re‑platform, refactor) and hybrid deployment models Ensure solutions meet industry compliance (HIPAA, SOC2, PCI‑DSS) and insurance regulatory requirements. Assess emerging technologies and trends to identify opportunities to improve performance, reduce costs, and enhance agility. Provide technical leadership and mentorship to cloud, infrastructure, and platform engineers; help uplift skills across the team Produce high‑quality architectural documentation, diagrams, and decision records that can be easily consumed by engineering and leadership teams. Governance & Standards Define architectural guardrails and operational readiness criteria to ensure transformation initiatives can be safely transitioned to RUN / XLA teams. Provide architectural governance and direction to managed service partners where required, ensuring RUN execution remains aligned to enterprise standards, target architecture, and performance expectations. Establish architecture standards, guardrails, reference patterns, and reusable modules expressed through Infrastructure as Code, policy‑as‑code, and architecture decision records. Provide design governance for new solutions, migrations, and major changes to ensure alignment with target‑state architecture, cyber expectations, operational resilience, and RUN / XLA readiness. Drive consistency, efficiency, and cost‑effectiveness across enterprise technology deployments. Define infrastructure resiliency, disaster recovery, and technology continuity architecture patterns in partnership with Business Resilience, Cyber, and platform teams. Collaboration & Leadership Act as the architecture partner to the Director of Infrastructure, supporting roadmap development, prioritization, transformation sequencing, and investment decisions. Mentor and guide senior domain engineers in applying architecture standards, reference patterns, and target‑state principles across Network, Systems, Storage, Telecom, and Cloud initiatives. Partner with enterprise architects, security architects, and business leaders to deliver end‑to‑end solutions. Act as a subject matter expert (SME) for infrastructure‑related decisions during solution design and vendor evaluations. Qualifications Education Bachelor’s degree in Computer Science, Information Technology, or related field (master’s preferred). Experience/Knowledge Technical Expertise Demonstrated experience defining target‑state architecture and architecture roadmaps across multiple infrastructure domains. Experience leading architecture for large‑scale infrastructure modernization, cloud migration, hybrid platform transformation, or legacy decommissioning initiatives. Experience influencing senior engineers, managed service partners, cyber teams, application teams, and business stakeholders without direct authority. Deep hands‑on experience with at least one major public cloud platform (e.g., Microsoft Azure, AWS, or GCP); strong preference for Azure in hybrid enterprise environments. Proven experience designing hybrid architectures spanning on‑premises data centers and public cloud, including connectivity, identity, and security. Strong understanding of enterprise identity and access management (e.g., Entra ID/Azure AD, Active Directory, SSO, RBAC, conditional access, workload identities). Expertise in cloud and hybrid networking (VNETs/VPCs, subnets, routing, DNS, load balancing, VPN, private connectivity such as ExpressRoute/Direct Connect). Solid knowledge of security architecture and Zero Trust principles, including network segmentation, encryption, secrets management, and security posture management tools. Hands‑on experience with Infrastructure as Code (e.g., Terraform, Ansible, Bicep, ARM, CloudFormation) and Git‑based workflows. Familiarity with CI/CD pipelines and how infrastructure integrates into DevOps toolchains. Understanding containerization and orchestration concepts (e.g., Docker, Kubernetes) and how they fit into hybrid architectures. Experience with monitoring, logging, and observability tools and patterns for distributed systems. Practical experience with application and infrastructure migration strategies, including assessment, planning, and execution in hybrid environments. Knowledge of cloud governance, policy‑as‑code, and compliance controls in enterprise environments. Awareness of FinOps principles and the cost implications of architectural choices. Deep knowledge of enterprise infrastructure (servers, storage, networking, cloud, virtualization, middleware). Strong experience in cloud platforms (AWS, Azure, GCP) and hybrid cloud strategies. Understanding of enterprise security frameworks and compliance standards for financial/insurance sectors. Familiarity with modern infrastructure technologies (containers, Kubernetes, automation frameworks, zero‑trust security). Familiarity with automation and Infrastructure‑as‑Code (Terraform, Ansible, etc.). Knowledge of cybersecurity principles and compliance frameworks (NIST, ISO 27001, etc.) Skills Strong systems thinking and ability to understand complex, interconnected environments. Excellent communication skills, with the ability to explain complex technical concepts to both technical and non‑technical stakeholders. Proven ability to lead architecture discussions, drive consensus, and influence without direct authority. Ability to document architecture, patterns, and decisions clearly and concisely. Required Experience/Knowledge 6+ years of IT infrastructure experience, with at least 3 years in an architecture role. Insurance of Finance industry experience is strongly preferred. Equivalent combination of education and deep, hands‑on enterprise architect experience will be considered Collaborative mindset and experience working across infrastructure, security, application, and business teams. Strong decision‑making skills with a focus on balancing risk, speed, cost, and long‑term maintainability. Preferred Certifications TOGAF, Zachman, or other Enterprise Architecture frameworks ITIL, PMP, or other relevant credentials Relevant cloud certifications (e.g., Azure Solutions Architect Expert, AWS Certified Solutions Architect – Professional) are a plus but not required if experience is strong. Reports to VP, Infrastructure & Operations What’s in it for you? The expected hiring compensation range for this position is $144,800 - $199,100 annually. This is a hybrid opportunity working in Frederick, MD. The total compensation package for this position may include other elements, such as a sign‑on bonus, long‑term incentives, and annual bonuses. This role is eligible to participate in the Annual Incentive Plan. The current target payment for the position is 20% of base salary, modified for corporate and individual performance. Bonuses are pro‑rated based on start date. This role has 20 vacation days and 10 sick days that are accrued on a bi‑weekly basis. Employees also have 9 paid holidays throughout the calendar year. We have a competitive compensation and benefits package focused on your overall wellbeing. Employee benefits include health, life, and dental insurance; 401K with company match up to 6% as well as a pension package; generous time off; and wellbeing initiatives throughout the year (we like doing fun stuff). We'll support and mentor you in your career progression and expect you to help us pay it forward by helping us develop tomorrow's leaders and growth‑focused professionals. We value our teams and our communities and believe in giving back. Enjoy time off to volunteer for those causes that matter most to you! If hired, employee will be in an at‑will position and the Company reserves the right to modify base salary (as well as any other discretionary payment or compensation program) at any time, including for reasons related to individual performance, Company or individual department/team performance, and market factors. The Company reserves the right to change benefits plans at any time. We are an equal opportunity employer and value diversity at our company. We do not discriminate based on race, religion, color, national origin, sex, gender, gender expression, sexual orientation, age, marital status, veteran status, or disability status. We will ensure that individuals with disabilities are provided reasonable accommodation to participate in the job application or interview process, perform essential job functions, and receive other benefits and privileges of employment. Please contact us to request accommodation. #J-18808-Ljbffr Banner Life family of companies