VP, Authentication Services

Role Summary/Purpose

Synchrony Identity and Access Management (IAM) is seeking a seasoned technical leader to spearhead our modern Authentication edge. Powered by adaptive multi-factor authentication (MFA), continuous adaptive trust, and advanced Single Sign-On (SSO), th e s e services and platforms serve as the bedrock of our enterprise Zero Trust Architecture.

Synchrony Identity and Access Management (IAM) is seeking a seasoned technical leader to spearhead our modern Authentication edge. Powered by adaptive multi-factor authentication (MFA), continuous adaptive trust, and advanced Single Sign-On (SSO), th e s e services and platforms serve as the bedrock of our enterprise Zero Trust Architecture.
As the VP of Authentication Services, you will operate as the Principal Platform Owner and Systems Architect for Synchrony’s workforce and B2B identity perimeters. In this role, you will direct an elite engineering organization tasked with architecting, scaling, and operating high throughput, high availability SSO, MFA, and passwordless pipelines. Serving as a premier technical thought leader, you will design distributed, fault‑tolerant authentication topologies and availability across all mission-critical enterprise applications.

• Product owner and thought leader that will own the workforce authentication strategy focused on security and user experience. Communicate and get buy-in on strategy to key stakeholder groups.
• Understand and implement leading authentication and authorization industry trends, proposing strategies to continually increase Synchrony’s authentication security and user experience.
• Platform Ownership:
  Direct product management and technical roadmaps for core authentication technologies (Okta, Yubi Keys, FIDO2/ Web Authn , and Might y  Services ) using Jira to build epics, features, and stories that optimize engineering velocity.
• Strategic
  
  Collaboration:
  
  Partner with the VP of Authentication & Security Services to build data driven business cases that justify, quantify, and prioritize high value product initiatives.
• Architecture & Design:
  Author secure production grade authentication patterns, zero-trust reference architectures, and cryptographic policy playbooks.
• Operational Leadership:
  Manage a 24/7 engineering and operations team ensuring high availability, system configuration management, incident response, and business continuity for mission-critical apps.
• App Integration:
  Oversee timely application authentication and authorization integrations while maintaining hands‑on technical knowledge of the underlying infrastructure.
• Governance & Risk:
  Enhance and enforce authentication policies, compliance standards, and risk metrics while conducting cost/ROI analysis.
• Relationship Management:
  Champion authentication services across the enterprise by advising cross-func tional business and technology teams on product capabilities.
• Develop and maintain value driven business relationships through effective needs analysis, program management, customer service and problem resolution .
• Champion authentication services by advising other business and technology teams on product capabilities.
• Understand and implement leading authentication and authorization industry trends, proposing strategies to continually increase Synchrony’s authentication security and user experience .
• Perform other duties and/or special projects as assigned

• Education:
  
  Bachelor’s degree in Computer Science , Computer Engineering, or a technical STEM discipline.
• Alternative
  
  Education:
  
  High School Diploma / GED with 15+ years of enterprise IT engineering experience.
• Experience:
  
  Minimum 10 years of total enterprise IT engineering experience.
• Okta Specialization:
  Minimum 5 years of hands‑on experience designing, scaling, and operating Okta Identity Cloud solutions (including Okta Advanced Server Access, API Access Management, and Workflows).
• Leadership:
  Minimum 5 years of experience leading and scaling distributed, cross‑functional engineering and infrastructure operations teams.
• Protocol Mastery:
  Expert‑level mastery of identity and cryptographic protocols including SAML…