Director, Platform Architect

Overview

Own the architecture of the Cloud & Engineering Platforms domain, setting the target architecture, reference designs and standards, leading the architecture team, and ensuring the domain is coherent, secure and aligned to enterprise architecture.

What you'll do

• Own the domain target architecture, standards and reference designs, aligned to DPTF strategy and to enterprise architecture.
• Lead the architecture team across the domain, managing performance, capability development and succession.
• Own the design assurance process for the domain, setting what must be reviewed, by whom, and against which standards.
• Embed AI patterns into the domain architecture, so that AI-assisted delivery and intelligent operations are designed in rather than added later.
• Architect for reliability and resilience by design across the domain, supporting the SLOs the domain commits to.
• Ensure security and compliance, including GxP where relevant, are designed into the domain rather than inspected in afterwards.
• Guide technology selection and modernisation across the domain, measuring outcomes against architecture OKRs.
• Set the architecture standards that supplier and managed-service solutions in the domain must meet.
• Align the domain to enterprise architecture and technology strategy, negotiating exceptions through Enterprise Architecture rather than around it.
• Advise the Head of Platform Domain on architectural risk, technical debt and the investment needed to address either.
• Increase pattern reuse and reduce rework across the domain, evidencing both with measures rather than assertion.
• Hold the boundaries with the Platform Architects on individual platform designs, the Engineering Director on build and delivery, and Enterprise Architecture on enterprise standards.

What you'll need

• Degree in a technology or engineering discipline, or equivalent practical experience (e.g., Computer Science, Software Engineering, Information Systems).
• Overall 18 years of experience, typically 10-12 years in technology architecture, including at least three years leading an architecture team with line responsibility.
• Proven experience leading architecture for a large-scale Cloud, Infrastructure & Engineering domain.
• Track record running design assurance governance, including holding a standard against delivery pressure.
• Experience architecting for reliability, resilience and security at scale, working to SLOs and error budgets.
• Experience in a regulated environment, ideally pharmaceutical or GxP.
• Experience setting architecture standards for supplier and managed-service delivery and enforcing them.
• Practical grasp of AI patterns for assisted delivery and intelligent operations at architecture level.
• Executive communication, translating architectural risk into investment and consequence for non-architects.
• Leadership of technical specialists, including developing architects who are strong individually but new to influence.
• Judgement about when the domain should diverge from enterprise standards and how to get that agreed properly.
• Ability to hold a standard when delivery timelines argue against it, without becoming an obstacle.
• Commercial awareness when directing supplier and vendor architecture decisions.
• Comfort making the cost of technical debt visible to leadership rather than absorbing it quietly.

Nice to have

• Architecture certifications, e.g., TOGAF, or recognised cloud or network architecture certification relevant to the domain.

Details

• Location: Bengaluru, Luxor North Tower.