Senior Architect - Cloud-Native Modernization

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Job Title: Sr. Solution Architect
Job Summary:

Heitmeyer Consulting is currently seeking Sr. Solution Architect for a direct hire or contract-to-hire opportunity with one of our financial services clients in Columbus, OH or Chicago, IL. This role is ideal for a candidate who thrives on challenge, enjoys solving complex problems, and can balance strategic thinking with hands-on execution. The successful candidate will play a critical role in defining the future state of our payment ecosystem, modernizing technology, and influencing both business and technical stakeholders.
This role requires someone who is framework agnostic when it comes to payment rails, comfortable engaging with vendors, and capable of designing end-to-end solutions across domestic and international payment networks, including ACH, wires, RTP, card networks, and cross-border systems. The candidate should be able to work both strategically and tactically, rolling up their sleeves to dive into the code when necessary while maintaining a clear vision for the architecture.
Key Responsibilities:

• Collaborate with business partners to understand current state and define a clear roadmap for modernization over the next 9–18 months.
• Design and implement scalable, secure, and resilient payment systems using Java and cloud-native technologies, preferably GCP (AWS experience is transferrable).
• Serve as a trusted advisor and storyteller, effectively communicating architectural decisions and influencing stakeholders.
• Lead architecture discussions across multiple payment rails, ensuring end-to-end integration, compliance, and operational excellence.
• Work closely with engineering teams, providing guidance, mentoring, and hands-on support as needed.
• Partner with incoming wires architects and other solution architects to ensure consistency and alignment across initiatives.
• Demonstrate curiosity, active listening, and a collaborative mindset while engaging with business partners and vendors.

Basic Qualifications:

• 10+ years’ experience in the banking industry
• Deep understanding of enterprise and modern architecture patterns, including event-driven, domain-driven, layered, and hexagonal/onion architectures.
• Extensive experience with microservices, service decomposition, API gateways, service mesh patterns, and resiliency strategies.
• Strong knowledge of payment orchestration, settlement, clearing systems, fraud mitigation, tokenization, and core banking integration.
• Familiarity with real-time and high-volume transaction systems, low-latency design, and high availability architecture.
• Proficiency in cloud-native platforms, container orchestration (Kubernetes), serverless design, and distributed systems.
• Experience with API lifecycle management, event streaming (Kafka, Pulsar, Kinesis), and messaging systems (MQ, Rabbit
  
  MQ).
• Knowledge of regulatory and compliance frameworks including PCI-DSS, KYC/AML, FFIEC, and financial industry standards.
• Understanding of security architecture principles including identity and access management, encryption, key management, and zero-trust models.

Heitmeyer Consulting is an equal opportunity employer and we encourage all qualified candidates to apply. Qualified applicants will be considered without regard to minority status, gender, disability, veteran status, or any other characteristic protected by law.