Enterprise Architect – Technical Strategy

Motability Operations Ltd; City of Edinburgh; On-site; GBP 90,000 - 130,000; Full time

Job summary

Motability Operations Ltd is seeking an Enterprise Architect with a strong technical focus to translate enterprise direction into practical technical strategy and guidance for engineering teams.

In this new role you will shape cross-domain technical direction, balance modern engineering practices with maintainable systems, and partner with Product Architects and Engineering Managers to ensure coherent architecture across the organisation.

Responsibilities

• Turn business priorities and enterprise direction into clear technical choices, principles and shared direction
• Lead technical thinking on significant cross-domain challenges, surfacing risks, dependencies and opportunities
• Shape the technical dimension of strategic planning, investment decisions and build, buy or reuse choices, considering value, cost, risk and long‑term maintainability
• Shape pragmatic modernisation paths that balance new capabilities, legacy technology, technical debt and service continuity
• Co‑create practical patterns across integration, APIs, identity, service design and other cross‑cutting areas
• Help teams define clear domain boundaries and shared language using appropriate modelling and architecture techniques
• Bring Data, Platform, Security and DevEx standards together as practical guidance that teams can use
• Support Product Architects and Technical Principals through peer support, review and the Architecture Community of Practice
• Bring domain views together to show the wider technical landscape, dependencies, risks and opportunities
• Establish practical approaches to surfacing architecture debt, technical risks and significant decisions
• Facilitate resolution of cross‑domain disagreements and elevate material trade‑offs through the appropriate route
• Help ensure governance enables good decisions without adding unnecessary approval layers
• Establish a connected view of domains, systems, services, ownership, decisions and technical guidance
• Make architecture information current, structured and useful to engineers, architects and AI‑enabled tools
• Integrate architecture documentation with engineering sources and workflows where practical
• Work with Product Architects to keep domain architecture, decisions and architecture debt visible and connected

Job description

We’re looking for an Enterprise Architect with a strong technical focus to turn enterprise direction into practical technical strategy and clear guidance for engineering teams.

This is a new, influential role with the opportunity to shape cross-domain technical direction and how architecture supports engineering across the organisation.

You will work alongside another Enterprise Architect focused on business strategy and enterprise change, and our Business Architect. Together, these roles provide complementary, cross-cutting architecture leadership across the organisation.

Your focus will be cross-domain technical strategy, modern engineering practices and consistent, sustainable technical decision-making. Product Architects retain architecture leadership within their domains, and engineering teams retain detailed design responsibility. Your role is to provide enterprise direction, connect thinking across domains and help resolve complex cross-cutting challenges.

You will partner closely with Engineering Managers, Technical Principals and Product Architects, while they retain accountability for architecture, engineering leadership and technical outcomes within their domains.

What you’ll be doing:

Shape enterprise technical strategy

• Turn business priorities and enterprise direction into clear technical choices, principles and shared direction
• Lead technical thinking on significant cross-domain challenges, surfacing risks, dependencies and opportunities
• Shape the technical dimension of strategic planning, investment decisions and build, buy or reuse choices, considering value, cost, risk and long‑term maintainability
• Shape pragmatic modernisation paths that balance new capabilities, legacy technology, technical debt and service continuity

Enable teams with practical guidance

• Co‑create practical patterns across integration, APIs, identity, service design and other cross‑cutting areas
• Help teams define clear domain boundaries and shared language using appropriate modelling and architecture techniques
• Bring Data, Platform, Security and DevEx standards together as practical guidance that teams can use
• Support Product Architects and Technical Principals through peer support, review and the Architecture Community of Practice

Create visibility and proportionate governance

• Bring domain views together to show the wider technical landscape, dependencies, risks and opportunities
• Establish practical approaches to surfacing architecture debt, technical risks and significant decisions
• Facilitate resolution of cross‑domain disagreements and elevate material trade‑offs through the appropriate route
• Help ensure governance enables good decisions without adding unnecessary approval layers

Build a connected architecture knowledge system

• Establish a connected view of domains, systems, services, ownership, decisions and technical guidance
• Make architecture information current, structured and useful to engineers, architects and AI‑enabled tools
• Integrate architecture documentation with engineering sources and workflows where practical
• Work with Product Architects to keep domain architecture, decisions and architecture debt visible and connected