VP, Functional Design Engineering

Job Overview

Lead with Purpose, Unlock Your Team’s Passion. At LPL, people leaders hold the key to the employee experience — shaping culture, driving performance, and guiding individuals to new heights.

Functional Design Engineering is where enterprise architecture intent becomes shippable Terraform. As the VP, Functional Design Engineering, you will lead the Functional Design Engineering & Strategy pod within the Foundations team in LPL’s Cloud Center of Excellence (CCOE). You will partner with Enterprise Architecture, Information Security, and engineering teams and pods across CCOE to translate enterprise architecture intent into implementable, well‑architected, code‑driven solutions.

You will produce detailed, opinionated, build‑ready engineering specifications aligned to the AWS Well‑Architected Framework and LPL’s standards, and curate the cross‑CCOE reference pattern library.

• Lead the Functional Design Engineering & Strategy pod within the Foundations team in CCOE; partner with Enterprise Architecture, Information Security, the other Foundations pods (Security & Governance, Fin Ops, Network Engineering, Monitoring), and the Platforms, Containers, Support, and Delivery teams to translate enterprise architecture intent into implementable, well‑architected, code‑driven solutions
• Take high‑level designs from architects and produce detailed, opinionated, build‑ready engineering specifications aligned to the AWS Well‑Architected Framework and LPL standards
• Define and curate the cross‑CCOE reference pattern library: domain‑tagged Terraform module bundles, reference architectures, anti‑patterns, and architecture decision records (ADRs)
• Partner closely with the Principal Engineer, Cloud Strategy Lead so that tooling, IaC, and self‑service platform strategy stay aligned with enterprise design direction
• Lead design reviews, architecture review boards, and engineering deep‑dives across all five CCOE teams (Foundations, Platforms, Containers, Support, Delivery) and the four peer Foundations pods (Security & Governance, Fin Ops, Network Engineering, Monitoring)
• Champion the application of the AWS Well‑Architected Framework across all six pillars (Operational Excellence, Security, Reliability, Performance Efficiency, Cost Optimization, Sustainability) and drive measurable improvements against each
• Hands‑on contribute to reference patterns, Terraform modules, and proof‑of‑concept builds, especially in the highest‑ambiguity areas where engineering is still discovering the right answer
• Embed agentic AI capabilities into the team’s engineering practice (e.g., Cursor, Claude Code, Bedrock, MCP servers, agentic IaC and review workflows) and into the platform’s self‑service experience for internal customers
• Embed agentic AI capabilities into the design function: AI‑assisted pattern generation, automated Well‑Architected reviews, ADR drafting, cross‑pattern impact analysis, and MCP‑backed agents that surface existing patterns to internal customers
• Recruit, develop, mentor, and retain a globally distributed team of senior cloud engineers across LPL’s US offices and India Global Capability Center (GCC)
• Own all people‑management responsibilities for the pod including hiring, onboarding, weekly 1:1s, performance management, compensation planning, career development, and certification‑path execution per the CCOE certification matrix
• Operate as a player‑coach: spend meaningful time hands‑on in Terraform code, design reviews, peer reviews, and incident response while leading people and delivery
• Lead and personally participate in 24x7 on‑call rotations as senior incident commander and technical escalation point for the pod
• Partner with peer VPs across the Cloud Center of Excellence — the leaders of the five CCOE teams (Foundations, Platforms, Containers, Support, Delivery) and the leaders of the pods within Foundations (Security & Governance, Fin Ops, Functional Design Engineering & Strategy, Network Engineering, Monitoring) — to align roadmaps and remove cross‑team and cross‑pod blockers
• Champion AWS Well‑Architected Framework adoption across all six pillars and drive continuous improvement against operational,…