The Job:
The main function of an IT architect is to collect and assess business requirements, identify technical specifications, and develop and implement technology solutions.

The Daily – Major Activities:
• Create high-level solutions for business applications, portfolios, enterprise systems, etc.
• Develop technology specifications and ensure that new technology solutions are designed for optimal access and usefulness.
• Apply architectural and engineering concepts to design a solution that meets operational requirements, such as scalability, maintainability, security, reliability, extensibility, flexibility, availability, and manageability.
• Design and develop architectures that support the company's corporate business strategy, enterprise information and data strategy.
• Assist in identifying the technologies to employ based on price, performance, service agreements, and organization constraints.
• Participate and lead research and development efforts (proofs of concept, prototypes), as subject matter experts, when introducing new technologies.
• Provide input to management throughout the project management lifecycle (PMLC) and assist managers with developing the service level agreements (SLAs) and deployment of key performance measures.
• Ensure technology solutions are production ready and meet the defined specifications; and that the solution can be maintained via production support methodologies and resources (knowledge management).
• Facilitate communications between workgroups and business stakeholders for technical issues and/or major changes; acting as the technical domain subject matter expert.
• Assume ownership of problems and incidents and communicate critical situation status.

The Essentials:
• Forward-thinking about the recommended services and anticipated business needs.
• Expert level of technical knowledge and understanding of architecture, application systems design and integration with large scale deployments.
• Experience with programming, engineering and/or systems analysis; broad level of understanding surrounding information systems.
• Strong technology implementation experience.
• Strong experience with deployment and administration of J2EE application servers and containers (e.g., Websphere, JBoss, Tomcat, Spring etc.); TIBCO suite of tools; Informatica suite of tools (e.g. PowerCenter, IDQ)
• Experience with SOA, ESB, JMS messaging, transaction, XML and/or Web Services integration technologies.
• ITILv3 certifications a plus
• Strong understanding of relational data structures, theories, principles, and practices - preferred.