Distinguished Architect - Security

Distinguished Architect Specializing In Security

We're building a world of health around every individual — shaping a more connected, convenient and compassionate health experience. At CVS Health®, you'll be surrounded by passionate colleagues who care deeply, innovate with purpose, hold ourselves accountable and prioritize safety and quality in everything we do. Join us and be part of something bigger – helping to simplify health care one person, one family and one community at a time.

We are seeking a highly experienced and technically skilled Distinguished Architect specializing in security to help drive our technology organization's future strategy. This role will require a deep understanding of the application of security to business applications. The successful candidate will be responsible for architecting security reference architectures that meet the needs of the broader technology organization.

What you will do:

• Be part of a team responsible for enabling secure technology solutions that meets our business strategy and drives business value.
• Define and collaborate on the creation of security roadmaps, security reference architectures, standards, best practice documents, and secure-by-design reference implementations that accelerate delivery while ensuring safety and compliance.
• Evaluate market trends in cybersecurity, execute buy vs. build decisions and assess cost and the risk impact on targeted business outcomes.
• Define future state security architecture that supports secure adoption of Artificial Intelligence, APIs, data stores, cloud infrastructures, cloud services, and microservices.
• Collaborate and consult with technology, cybersecurity, and business partners to optimize business applications and systems that adopt modern and secure architectures, especially around AI.
• Develop and maintain a strategic vision for the secure use of AI technologies, aligned to the CVS Health platform based on key business drivers, regulatory requirements, and emerging threat trends.
• Define and collaborate on the creation of security frameworks for the enterprise that promote reuse, reduces cost, manages risk, and increases speed to market.
• Effectively build and maintain strong relationships with technology, cybersecurity, and business partners to establish trust and influence key security decisions.
• Provide guidance, direction and mentorship to engineers and other stakeholders regarding security architecture and secure design of enterprise applications.
• Ensure all Non-Functional Security Requirements (e.g., authentication, authorization, resilience, encryption, auditability, availability, etc.) are properly articulated, and work with all parties to guarantee that delivered software products meet these objectives.
• Participates in high-level security estimation and security evaluation of AI-enabled solutions.
• Mentor and coach junior architects and seek the opportunity to bring continuous improvement in secure engineering and enterprise security practices.
• Strategize and outline long-term security architectural plans for a complex technology environment.

Required Qualifications:

• 15+ years of relevant work experience (10+ years in technical security leadership roles)
• 10+ years of experience building or securing large-scale business applications using modern technologies and architectural patterns.
• 10+ years of experience designing secure integrations with a focus on performance, resilience, and loose coupling using APIs, microservices, and event-driven architecture.
• Evidence of significant contributions in previous roles and/or to the broader industry.
• Expert-level understanding of security architectural methodologies/best practices, regulatory and compliance requirements, and risk frameworks that influence architecture decisions.
• Recognized technical leader with full stack technology knowledge and recognized as an expert in multiple security domains such as: Identity & access management (IAM), network security, cloud security (AWS/Azure/GCP), data protection, zero trust, or security operations.
• Experience recognizing the impact security architecture decisions can have on strategic business decisions.
• Substantial experience with requirements analysis, risk assessment, estimation, and secure application design.
• Expert understanding of architectural governance, security design patterns, AI safety controls, secure development standards, and best practices.
• A diverse technical background with key areas of depth around AI/ML/Agentic AI security, cloud security, data platform security, hybrid solutions and operating securely at scale.
• Excellent collaboration, influencing, negotiation, coaching and coalition-building skills.

Preferred Qualifications:

• Experience developing security architecture using agile methodology.
• Experience in AI security architecture and practical application of AI technologies.
• Experience with the concepts and practical application of AI security, and the future of secure autonomous systems.
• A self-starter that is naturally inquisitive and proactive in identifying threats and emerging risks.
• Infrastructure experience and expertise (e.g. private/public cloud)
• Master's or PhD. degree.

Education

Bachelor's degree in computer science or related field.

Pay Range

The typical pay range for this role is:

$175,100.00 - $334,750.00

This pay range represents the base hourly rate or base annual full-time salary for all positions in the job grade within which this position falls. The actual base salary offer will depend on a variety of factors including experience, education, geography and other relevant factors. This position is eligible for a CVS Health bonus, commission or short-term incentive program in addition to the base pay range listed above. This position also includes an award target in the company's equity award program.

Our people fuel our future. Our teams reflect the customers, patients, members and communities we serve and we are committed to fostering a workplace where every colleague feels valued and that they belong.

Great benefits for great people

We take pride in offering a comprehensive and competitive mix of pay and benefits that reflects our commitment to our colleagues and their families.

This full‑time position is eligible for a comprehensive benefits package designed to support the physical, emotional, and financial well‑being of colleagues and their families. The benefits for this position include medical, dental, and vision coverage, paid time off, retirement savings options, wellness programs, and other resources, based on eligibility.

Additional details about available benefits are provided during the application process and on Benefits Moments.