VP – Data Architecture Governance

Role Summary /

Purpose:

The VP – Data Architecture Governance leader is a strategic leadership role within Synchrony’s Data & Analytics Engineering organization responsible for enterprise data platform architecture governance, risk & controls oversight, and architecture decision leadership. This role ensures enterprise-wide alignment of data architecture standards, reference patterns, and control requirements to support Synchrony’s evolving data landscape and long-term business objectives. As a leader, you will work extensively with senior architects, engineering teams, Internal Audit, risk and compliance functions to design controls-by-design architecture guardrails and ensure they are implemented and evidenced through engineering workflows across AWS cloud services (e.g., Redshift, EMR, Sage Maker, etc.),

Ab Initio, Kafka, Hadoop, Oracle, Snowflake and SAS – which collectively support Synchrony’s enterprise-wide data, AI and analytics needs to enable informed decision-making and business growth.

• Own the L3 data architecture governance process, ensuring standards, procedures, and job aids are defined, maintained, and aligned with Synchrony’s strategic objectives including cloud modernization efforts.
• Collaborate with enterprise and domain architects to align data architecture standards and controls across Synchrony.
• Lead issue and risk management activities for data architecture, including tracking, resolving, and documenting closure of control gaps and audit findings; drive root‑cause analysis and sustainable remediation.
• Drive coordination of audits, regulatory requests, and certifications (e.g., SOX), ensuring timely responses and remediation.
• Author and curate executive and regulator–ready architecture governance content (e.g., standards, policies, control narratives, procedures, evidence packs, and briefing materials), ensuring clarity, consistency, and auditability.
• Partner with compliance, risk, business stakeholders and engineering teams to embed controls into data platform processes supporting operational resilience and regulatory compliance.
• Maintain risk and control documentation and update governance tools to track risk posture and mitigation actions.
• Communicate progress and risk exposure regularly to senior leadership.
• Chair/lead architecture design reviews for critical data engineering initiatives (batch + streaming), approving reference patterns for ingestion, transformation, storage, and consumption (APIs, datasets, events) and ensuring alignment to target‑state architecture.
• Define technical guardrails and ensure adherence to approved reference architectures for data domains and products (data modeling, data contracts, metadata/lineage, data quality, security), including standards for cloud‑native implementations and migration from legacy platforms.
• Drive automation of architecture compliance by partnering with platform/Dev Ops teams to embed controls into engineering workflows (e.g., CI/CD checks, configuration baselines, policy‑as‑code, automated evidence capture/monitoring).
• Perform other duties and/or special projects as assigned.

• Bachelor’s Degree in Computer Science or related field and a minimum 10+ years’ experience in information technology; or high school/GED with 15+ years of Information technology experience.
• Minimum of 8 years of progressive experience in governance role supporting engineering org or senior data architecture roles within regulated environments, with preference for financial services.
• Proven experience owning data platform architecture governance and control frameworks and driving compliance activities from design through implementation and evidence.
• Strong collaboration skills to work effectively with architects, engineers, risk, and audit teams.
• Experience managing audit coordination and regulatory compliance activities for technology platforms.
• Knowledge of industry best practices in data architecture and governance, with focus on cloud modernization initiatives.
• Strong communication skills, including ability to brief executive leadership on risk and compliance matters.
• Familiarity with risk management and issue…