Director Portfolio Architecture

Permanent Full Time

Reporting to the Enterprise Architect, this is the 2nd most senior architecture role in a major line of business. An expert in the architecture of a large product group or ecosystem, the Portfolio Architect proactively and holistically guides its evolution and implementation. These solutions collectively enable the future‑state business capabilities and drive the organization’s targeted business‑outcomes.

Accountable for ensuring the future orientation of the ecosystem aligns with and informs the Line of Business Strategy and Enterprise Architecture, this role maintains the target state architecture and roadmap for the product group/ecosystem and guides the work of solution designers in its implementation.

The Portfolio Architects guide & approve designs developed by Solution Architects and bring forward architecturally significant decisions/solutions to the Architecture Review Council for approval. They understand the business strategy, the unit’s enterprise architecture strategy and translate both into system changes required for achievement.

This role collaborates with the Enterprise Architect and Line of Business leaders on the development of the Line of Business IT Strategy. Success in this role requires a strong partnership with the Enterprise Architect and senior business and IT leaders in the Line of Business, and for the incumbent to balance the need for strategic technology advancement with delivery pressures.

The successful candidate will provide technology leadership and innovation focused on the Data & Analytics Platform Technology, and Information and Common Data Modeling portfolio. This portfolio develops and maintains the strategy and roadmap for delivering and evangelizing state of the art Data & Analytics capabilities, representing enterprise Data in a meaningful manner and enabling value creation through efficient application of Data.

This is an enterprise level role that will be responsible for the technology strategy, solutioning oversight, and governance to architectural standards.

• Accountable to ensure high quality delivery of leading‑edge solutions that meet time and cost requirements that align with business unit (BU) and enterprise architecture principles and design standards
• Proactively identify areas (i.e. trendspotting) and opportunities to use technology to enhance customer experience and/or organizational efficiency
• Research and recommend opportunities to leverage technology and keep up with the industry to support the strategy
• Directs technology research and sponsors line of business (LOB) initiatives (early‑stage development/prototype) in support of BU strategy
• Support development of business strategies by producing Data & Analytics platform capability model, technology roadmaps, architectural standards and patterns to achieve business plans
• Establish Enterprise Information Model by producing Ontologies and Taxonomies relevant to Canada Life business domains e.g. Health & Dental Insurance, Investing & Saving, Retirement, etc.
• Enable reuse of common Data models and develop Data modeling best practices
• Provides leadership in managing IT risk (e.g.: security, disaster recovery, technology solution quality, etc.) and control requirements
• Drive a high‑performance culture for practitioner Solution Architects and influence this culture within IT
• Ensure leaders, employees and vendors work together to drive performance and that high expectations are achieved within the values of the organization

• Bachelor Computer Science / Software Engineering or equivalent degree
• 10+ years of demonstrated experience in IT environments with a preference for significant complexity, highly regulated, and/or financial services
• 5+ progressive leadership experience related to both projects and teams
• Prior experience working in an Architect capacity and exposure to Architecture governance and thought leadership in Data Architecture preferred
• Expertise in the following domains:
  Data Integration (Batch & Real Time), Data Storage (Data Warehouse & Data Lake), Master Data Management (MDM), Advanced Analytics (BI & AI/ML), Data Modeling also including Data…