IT Solutions Architect

We are Oregon’s largest locally owned and #1 Most Admired public accounting firm, and we are adding an IT Solutions Architect to our team! We seek people who are a little better than the rest – a little smarter, more insightful, more ambitious, and a lot more fun. We hire great people and give them a great place to work. Our secret to keeping them around is a positive culture, challenging and interesting work, and a dedication to continuous learning.

Please note this role will have a start date no earlier than May 1, 2025.

The IT Solutions Architect is crucial to driving technology solutions for the firm, ensuring optimal performance across a variety of tools, software’s and workflows. In this role you will be responsible for ensuring that existing and new technologies are aligned with strategic firm initiatives and business objectives. This is a highly collaborative role where you’ll work not only with your fellow IT team but also with firm leadership and external technology partners. Your day to day will be varied, and will include everything from meeting with end users to learn about the tools and processes they use on a daily basis, to conducting needs analysis across platforms, and evaluating and in some cases recommending new software and systems. You will look at current firm processes and design integrations to work better together, reducing redundancies, achieving more automations, and improving processes. In most cases you won’t be spearheading the search for best tools (our industry experts will research and come to the table with those), but you’ll step in when appropriate and lend your expertise, identifying what would work best from a strategic perspective. And what’s an IT role without documentation and training? The team will rely on you to create technical documentation, architecture diagrams, and training materials for internal teams on solutions and best practices. It’s high visibility, but exciting and impactful work.

What makes you a fit for this role?

You have a keen eye for process improvement and connecting the dots to make things work better. You are technically curious, solutions-driven and have a strong understanding of enterprise architecture and IT infrastructure. You have held a similar role before, can assess and design solutions, and effectively communicate them through various methods and to varying degrees of seniority and understanding. You have a combination of solid project management experience, a broad understanding of cloud based and local technologies, and you want to design solutions to make things run their most efficiently. You understand how software is coded and how it works but you’re looking to design things for a higher level – instead of writing the code, you’ll know how it all fits together to effectively drive the integration of existing technology and the adoption of new technologies. This is not a software developer role, but some past experience in a developer role wouldn’t hurt.

This is not a behind the scenes role. You should enjoy interacting with others at all levels in an organization and comfortable working directly with executive teams or company owners. You are flexible to meet changing business needs. Of course you should also have experience with all phases of the SDLC and full lifecycle implementations. You’re organized and like to stay updated with the latest trends, technologies, and innovations, and make recommendations for enhancements and improvements. You have deep project management experience—appropriately prioritizing/deprioritizing, keeping things moving, bringing all the right people into the planning and discussion, anticipating and resolving problems, etc., for effective execution and completion of projects. You’re creative in finding solutions and work with your smart team to do so. Finally, you must have a positive, friendly demeanor and a sense of humor. We take our work seriously around here, but not our egos.

A culture where flexibility and balance add up to success.

Public accounting is a demanding profession, which is the very reason for our ‘people-first’ culture. We invite, support, and celebrate remote work. We trust our people so there’s no need to micromanage schedules or scrutinize “butts in seats” to know that great work is getting done. In fact, over 20% of our employees are fully remote from outside of the Pacific Northwest.

Nonetheless, given the nature of responsibilities in this role, we have a strong preference for a local candidate who will embrace a hybrid work model, regularly working in-office at least one to two days per week. Highly qualified, non-local candidates may be considered if they’re willing to spend three to five consecutive workdays in Portland, OR, four times per year. When in the office, you’ll enjoy beautiful surroundings, ample public transportation options, paid parking, a bike garage, gym for employees, lots of complimentary snacks, and other amenities.

Requirements

For those who like a checklist of qualifications, here you go:

• 7-10 years of relevant experience (preferably closer to 10 years); a degree in Computer Science, Information Technology, or a related field is preferred but not required. 10+ years of experience with additional certifications such as TOGAF, AWS, Microsoft of Google will be considered equivalent.
• Experience working in Professional services or public accounting environment desired.
• Demonstrated ability to design solutions and effectively communicate them through standard methods, including logical diagrams, integration diagrams, and deployment diagrams.
• The ability to evaluate new technologies, frameworks, and tools to assess their suitability for solving specific business problems and meeting project requirements.
• Knowledge and experience of all phases of the SDLC and full lifecycle implementations using traditional waterfall/iterative and more modern agile methodologies.
• Experience in developing solutions utilizing various technology stacks and methodologies.
• Proficiency in cloud platforms such as AWS, Azure, or Google Cloud, including knowledge of cloud architecture, services, and deployment models.
• Familiarity with development practices, including continuous integration, continuous delivery, and infrastructure automation, to enable efficient solution deployment and management.
• Understanding of security principles, data protection, and compliance requirements to design secure and compliant solutions.
• Hands-on experience with identifying and resolving complex technical issues, as well as providing guidance to technical teams in troubleshooting and problem-solving.
• Excellent analytical, problem-solving, and critical thinking skills.
• Experience using project and task management systems, such as the Atlassian Suite preferred
• Accounting or finance industry related experience and knowledge desirable

Benefits

Compensation and benefits:

• Salary range is $120K - $140K annually, varying DOE
• 401(k) profit sharing plan; immediate vesting of employer contributions
• 14.5 paid holidays, 5 weeks of PTO, up to 12 weeks paid medical leave (includes parental leave) and a sabbatical program for all employees

Interested in learning more?

We keep it simple: just submit your resume or LinkedIn profile—no tedious application form or cover letter required (but we read them if you include one). A member of the Talent Acquisition team will be in touch shortly.

Perkins & Co is an Equal Opportunity Employer