Azure Data & AI Architecture Lead for 5-Day Pulses

Critical Propulsion; United States; Hybrid; USD 140,000 - 210,000; Full time

Benefits offered by this job

Competitive compensation

Autonomy

Pulse cycle delivery

Job summary

Critical Propulsion is seeking an architect to provide technical direction for a swarm-based product built in 5-day Pulse cycles. You will own architecture, data systems, and infrastructure decisions that guide multiple cycles ahead.

Ideal candidates bring deep Azure cloud experience, data platform design at scale, and fluency in Python or TypeScript, plus hands-on experience with AI tooling and client-facing architecture work.

Qualifications

• Experience leading architecture for AI-driven platforms.
• Ability to design data pipelines and analytics infrastructure at scale.
• Proven track record working with Azure cloud services and IaC.

Responsibilities

• Own technical direction for a swarm-based product built in 5-day Pulse cycles.
• Make architecture decisions that sustain coherence across multiple cycles.
• Collaborate with data engineering, cloud infra, and application architecture teams.
• Review AI agent outputs and iterate quickly.
• Engage directly with clients on technical direction and provide concrete options.

Skills

Azure cloud

Data platform design

Python

TypeScript

Node.js

Agentic AI tools

Architectural leadership

Client-facing design

Small teams

Education

Bachelor's degree (relevant field)

Tools

Claude Code

Cursor

Copilot Workspace

Job description

What you'll own

Technical direction for a swarm building a product every Pulse cycle. System design, integration strategy, data architecture, infrastructure decisions, and increasingly, how Amplify itself gets applied to the build. You treat architecture as a product asset: what you build today either compounds or forecloses what ships three cycles from now. You make the calls that keep a product coherent across cycles instead of a stack of one-off fixes.

How we build

Critical Propulsion pairs senior consultants with AI agents inside Amplify, our agentic delivery framework, to build products in 5-day Pulse cycles. Consultants own the judgment: what to build, what ships, which gate a release has to clear. Agents handle the volume: code generation, testing, the repeatable work a team of ten used to grind through.

Some engagements close out at delivery. Others keep going, the swarm shipping against a live roadmap cycle after cycle. Either way, week 1 is working product, not onboarding.

What we expect

• You weigh technical debt against roadmap speed as a product decision, not a hygiene issue. You can tell the difference between debt worth taking on this cycle and debt that quietly taxes every cycle after it.
• You make architecture decisions that hold up under 5-day delivery pressure, and under a product's second, third, and tenth cycle. No design that impresses in a review and buckles the first time requirements shift.
• You work cross-functionally, with real capability across data engineering, cloud infrastructure, and application architecture. You know how a decision in one domain ripples through the others.
• You embrace agentic development. You delegate real work to AI agents inside Amplify, review their output critically, and iterate fast. This is how the swarm builds now.
• You know which architectural decisions to delegate to agents and which ones need your judgment.
• You partner with the Product Delivery Lead before scope gets committed, not after. If something in the roadmap isn't buildable in a Pulse cycle, that's a conversation in the banding meeting, not a surprise in week three.
• You talk to the client directly when the technical direction is in question. You bring a better option, not a committee.
• You're a contributing architect. You set direction and you build. You write production code alongside the swarm, not just diagrams and decision docs.
• You operate autonomously. No status meetings that could be a message. No decks that could be a decision.
  
  

What we don't filter on

• Years of experience as a number. If you can set technical direction for a swarm shipping a product in 5-day Pulse cycles, the number is irrelevant.

Ideal candidates bring…

• Deep experience with Azure cloud services, including infrastructure as code, networking, and platform services in production.
• Experience designing data platforms, pipelines, or analytics infrastructure at scale, using tools like Azure Data Factory, Synapse, Databricks, dbt, or equivalent.
• Fluency in Python, Node.js, or TypeScript at a systems level, not just application code.
• Hands-on experience with agentic AI tooling: Claude Code, Cursor, Copilot Workspace, or similar. Better still if you've shaped how a team uses these tools, not just used them yourself.
• Experience designing systems where AI is a first-class component, not a bolt-on.
• Comfort with spec-driven design. You've written specs a swarm can build from in a single Pulse cycle without ambiguity or rework.
• Background making architecture decisions with a client in the room, not just an internal stakeholder.
• Prior experience on small, autonomous teams. You've set direction for a 3-4 person crew, not managed a 15-person org chart.

What you get

• A team where everyone builds. No layers of management between you and the work.
• AI agents as real teammates inside Amplify. You'll shape how the swarm uses agentic tooling, not just consume it.
• Pulse cycles that create rhythm without sprint overhead (KT +75%, Rework +60%, Mgmt +45% in typical sprint models).
• Product impact you can see. Your architecture decisions show up in production within days, and hold up across the cycles that follow.
• Competitive comp

How to apply

Send us something that shows how you think about systems. A design doc, an architecture decision record, a write-up of a hard technical call you made. Skip the cover letter unless you actually want to write one.

Let's have a real conversation. No fluff.