Senior Enterprise Architect - SOA

If you’re passionate about building a better future for individuals, communities, and our country—and you’re committed to working hard to play your part in building that future—consider WGU as the next step in your career.

Driven by a mission to expand access to higher education through online, competency-based degree programs, WGU is also committed to being a great place to work for a diverse workforce of student-focused professionals. The university has pioneered a new way to learn in the 21st century, one that has received praise from academic, industry, government, and media leaders. Whatever your role, working for WGU gives you a part to play in helping students graduate, creating a better tomorrow for themselves and their families.

The Senior Enterprise Architect designs, implements, maintains, and solves complex enterprise-wide solutions.  This role evaluates current systems and applies technical proficiency, creativity, and collaboration to recommend enhancements to ensure flexibility, resilience, scalability, and high performance.  The Senior Enterprise Architect is recognized as a master within the technical discipline and will possess extensive experience in building robust systems and strong collaboration, design, and negotiation skills to align technology solutions with business objectives.  This position works closely with cross-functional, distributed teams to develop and sustain a cohesive enterprise architecture framework that supports organizational goals.  This position offers the opportunity to shape our technological landscape and drive transformative change.

Primary Responsibilities

• Defines and enforces architecture standards, SOA principles, design patterns, and best practices.

• Frequently provides mentorship, guidance, and training to team members and other employees across the organization.

• Functions as subject matter expert within Enterprise Architecture.

• Defines and documents current, iterative, and future-state architectures by recommending, implementing, and aligning with industry best practices and the University’s strategic objectives.

• Collaborates within and outside of Enterprise Architecture with stakeholders to translate business requirements into flexible, scalable, and resilient architectural designs.

• Influences and informally leads cross-functional teams to ensure alignment between business needs and technology solutions.

• Communicates complex technical concepts to non-technical stakeholders.

• Provides strategic guidance on emerging technologies and trends.

• Develops and communicates technology strategy to diverse audiences.

• Leads continuous improvement initiatives to enhance enterprise architecture efficiency and effectiveness.

• Evaluates, recommends, and selects appropriate complex technologies, tools, and vendors to support objectives.

• Conducts architectural complex reviews, performance assessments, and capacity planning to optimize and mitigate risks.

• Ensures compliance with security and regulatory requirements in all architecture.

• Facilitates architectural discussions to achieve consensus, awareness, support, and alignment.

• Performs other job-related duties as assigned.

Qualifications

Knowledge, Skills, and Abilities

• Acknowledged within field of expertise as a subject matter expert.

• Deep understanding of enterprise architecture principles, frameworks, and methodologies.

• Expertise in designing and optimizing systems for performance, reliability, and scalability to meet stringent SLAs and uptime requirements.

• Exceptional collaboration, design, and negotiation skills, with the ability to effectively communicate, present, and document complex technical concepts to diverse stakeholders.

• Proven ability to lead cross-functional teams and drive consensus in a fast-paced, dynamic environment.

• Proficiency in using visualization tools like Visio, Lucid, or similar for architectural solutions.

• Excellent analytical and problem-solving skills with strong attention to detail.

• Strong commitment to continuous learning and professional development.

Education

• Bachelor’s degree in Computer Science, Information Technology, or a related field.

• In lieu of a degree: An equivalent combination of training, experience, credentials, or accomplishments may substitute for the education degree requirements.

Experience

• 10 years of relevant experience.

• 3 years as an Enterprise Architect or 8 years in a technical leadership role (e.g., technical lead, principal engineer).

• Proven experience designing and developing service-oriented architectures with a shift-left cybersecurity focus.

• Development experience in languages such as Java, C++, or Python.

• Proven experience in architecting high-resiliency solutions, focusing on performance testing, fault tolerance, and scalability.

Preferred Qualifications

• Master’s degree in Computer Science, Information Technology, or a related field.

• Knowledge of UML (Unified Modeling Language).

• Experience with tools such as Jira and Confluence.

• Certification in cloud technologies and enterprise architecture (e.g., TOGAF, Zachman).

• Experience with cloud platforms (e.g., AWS, Azure, GCP).

• Experience with containerization technologies (e.g., Docker, Kubernetes).

• Experience with distance education and distance learning students.

#LI-HYBRID

#LI-ZARD

The salary range for this position takes into account the wide range of factors that are considered in making compensation decisions including but not limited to skill sets; experience and training; licensure and certifications; and other business and organizational needs.

At WGU, it is not typical for an individual to be hired at or near the top of the range for their position, and compensation decisions are dependent on the facts and circumstances of each case. A reasonable estimate of the current range is:
 

How to apply: apply online

Full-time Regular Positions (FT classification, standard working hours = 40)

This is a full-time, regular position that is eligible for bonuses; medical, dental, vision, telehealth and mental healthcare; health savings account and flexible spending account; basic and voluntary life insurance; disability coverage; accident, critical illness and hospital indemnity supplemental coverages; legal and identity theft coverage; retirement savings plan; wellbeing program; discounted WGU tuition; and flexible paid time off for rest and relaxation with no need for accrual, flexible paid sick time with no need for accrual, 11 paid holidays, and other paid leaves, including up to 12 weeks of parental leave.

The University is an equal opportunity employer. All qualified applicants will receive consideration for employment without regard to race, color, religion, sex, sexual orientation, gender identity, national origin, disability or protected veteran status.