Chief Architect

Bank of London; London; On-site; GBP 100,000 - 140,000; Full time

Job summary

A financial institution in London is hiring a Chief Architect to develop solutions for banking challenges. This role involves close collaboration with technology and product teams, requiring extensive experience in banking, especially in payments. Candidates should have strong communication skills and the ability to thrive in a fast-paced environment, with responsibilities including designing technical solutions and guiding teams. The position is office-based in London with potential travel to other locations.

Qualifications

• Experience in banking, specifically with payments ecosystems.
• Broad technology experience in designing comprehensive solutions across multiple applications and suppliers.

Responsibilities

• Communicate effectively across the bank and with clients to understand business problems and design solutions.
• Provide technical direction to internal and external teams.
• Understand banking operations, payment schemes, and regulatory expectations.

Skills

Excellent communication skills

Problem-solving

Detail-oriented

Leadership skills

Job description

Social network you want to login/join with:

Chief Architect Bank of London offers a safer business banking model by holding all deposits at the Bank of England, eliminating the risk of 'bank runs.' It provides services such as Deposit-as-a-Service (DaaS), Embedded Banking, real-time Clearing, Payments, and Settlement, as well as Commercial Banking tailored to businesses. Powered by proprietary technology, the bank collaborates with SAP Fioneer to deliver innovative solutions. With a focus on exceptional service and core values of passion, ownership, and curiosity, the bank strives for excellence in all it does.

Bank of London is looking for a Chief Architect to create solutions to our biggest challenges and provide direction to our engineering teams. This is an individual contributor role reporting directly to and working closely with the Chief Technology Officer. Our technology organization has approximately 30 colleagues, plus third-party suppliers. While leadership is expected from the successful candidate, this role does not initially have line management responsibilities. However, it is expected to deputize for the CTO and serve as a stepping stone towards a CTO role.

We are a small, dynamic company where architecture work has traditionally been carried out by engineering teams. Given planned significant investments in new business capabilities, this new role has been created to shape major initiatives and provide design guidance for both internal and third-party engineering teams.

Critical experience areas include banking domain knowledge, especially around payments, core banking, and channels. The candidate should possess broad technical knowledge across software, data, infrastructure, and security architecture, with primary expertise in solution architecture and designing comprehensive end-to-end solutions. Our technology is cloud-based, with internally developed channel applications hosted on AWS, and third-party hosted core banking and payments engines.

This senior role is for a detail-oriented practitioner, not a manager. Responsibilities include writing documents, creating diagrams, mapping fields, building software prototypes, writing SQL, calling APIs, and solving problems pragmatically. Strong communication skills and delivery focus are essential. The environment is fast-paced with a flat structure that promotes rapid decision-making and delivery. The candidate will work closely with colleagues in Product and Technology and interact with various functions within the bank and clients to understand their requirements and challenges.

Responsibilities

• Communicate effectively across the bank and with clients to understand business problems and design solutions.
• Provide technical direction to internal and external teams.
• Understand banking operations, payment schemes, and regulatory expectations.

Requirements

• Positive self-starter with excellent communication skills, well-organized, capable of establishing strong relationships with a diverse range of stakeholders.
• Leadership skills and credibility to drive decision-making and build consensus.
• Calm demeanor with the ability to perform well in a fast-paced environment.
• Experience in banking, specifically with payments ecosystems.
• Broad technology experience with designing comprehensive solutions across multiple applications and suppliers.

Location

The role is based in our London office near Bank, with occasional travel to Belfast and Vilnius, our other strategic locations.

London (5 days per week in the office). Travel to other locations may be required occasionally.

Diversity

Bank of London is an equal opportunity employer committed to inclusion, diversity, and belonging. All qualified applicants will receive consideration regardless of race, color, age, religion, sex, sexual orientation, gender identity, national origin, or military veteran status.