Solution Architect – Corporate Functions Finance and Risk

Guardian Life; Holmdel Township (NJ); Hybrid; USD 119,000 - 195,000; Full time

Job summary

Guardian Life is seeking a Solution Architect for Finance, Risk and Investments. The role focuses on owning and shaping enterprise-scale technical solutions, aligning with Guardian standards, and delivering secure, scalable architectures across value streams.

Collaboration with EA, product teams, and platforms enables sustainable delivery and risk-aware decisions. The position requires hands-on architecture leadership, mentoring engineers, and guiding design choices to reduce debt while scaling

Qualifications

• Strong experience designing and delivering enterprise-scale technology solutions.
• Working knowledge of cloud platforms, APIs, data integration, and modern application architectures.
• Experience collaborating within Agile / product-based delivery models.
• Experience in designing hybrid architectures where applications reside both on-premise and public cloud.
• Proven track record of architecting solutions in Insurance domain.

Responsibilities

• Own product/team-level solution design and delivery architecture.
• Collaborate with Principal Solution Architect for patterns/guardrails and BU priorities.
• Design and document solution architectures, including application, integration, data, and infrastructure components.
• Partner with Product Owners and Tech Leads to align roadmaps and trade-offs.
• Provide hands-on guidance to teams on design quality and technical approaches.
• Lead proof-of-concepts for new business capabilities and influence technology strategy.

Skills

Enterprise-scale solutions

Cloud platforms

APIs

Agile delivery models

Hybrid architectures

GenAI frameworks

Technical communication

Job description

Solution Architect – Finance, Risk and Investments

Position Overview: The Solution Architect is responsible for owning and shaping technical solutions at the value-stream and product level, ensuring architectural alignment, scalability, and adherence to Guardian standards. This role is hands-on and execution-oriented, partnering closely with Tech Leads, Product Owners, and delivery teams to translate business needs into sound, secure, and resilient technology solutions.

This role operates within a federated Enterprise Architecture (EA) model, partnering closely with business technology and platform teams to shape solutions in real time while improving accountability, speed, and delivery alignment. The architect remains connected to the central EA core through enterprise standards, governance, communities of practice, and cross-functional collaboration to ensure consistent, risk-aware technology decisions across domains.

The Solution Architect focuses on solution design, delivery enablement, and technical problem solving, building solutions while collaborating with Business stakeholders, Enterprise Architecture and platform teams to align with broader enterprise patterns.

Key Responsibilities:

• Owns product/team-level solution design and delivery architecture
• Works with Principal Solution Architect for patterns/guardrails; Head of Portfolio Architecture for BU priorities; Principal Enterprise Architect only when enterprise exceptions or cross-domain conflicts arise
• Own product- and team-level technical architecture decisions within a value stream.
• Design and document solution architectures, including application, integration, data, and infrastructure components.
• Partner with Product Owners and Tech Leads to align roadmaps, MVP scope, and technical trade-offs.
• Ensure solutions follow Guardian architecture standards, security requirements, and design patterns.
• Collaborate with Enterprise Architecture and platform teams to reuse enterprise capabilities where appropriate
• Identify, manage, and help resolve technical dependencies and impediments impacting delivery
• Provide hands-on guidance to teams on design quality, code structure, and technical approaches
• Lead proof-of-concepts for new business capabilities, Influencing Technology Strategy, Solution Design, Architecture Standards
• Mentor engineers on architecture principles, design decisions, and problem-solving techniques
• Continuously look for opportunities to simplify designs, reduce technical debt, and improve delivery efficiency
• Where applicable, the role will be accountable to build solutions that scale and algin to business and technology requirements
• Available for production incidents with major impact to business operations

You Have:

• Strong experience designing and delivering enterprise-scale technology solutions.
• Working knowledge of cloud platforms, APIs, data integration, and modern application architectures.
• Experience collaborating within Agile / product-based delivery models.
• Experience in designing hybrid architectures where applications reside both on-premise and public cloud including understanding of cloud provider services.
• Proven track record of architecting solutions that demand operating large scale business critical systems in Insurance domain.
• Good understanding of GenAI frameworks, tools and best practices
• Ability to balance speed, quality, risk, and long-term sustainability in technical decisions.
• Strong communication skills to translate technical concepts for business and delivery stakeholders.
• Experience producing product-level and team-level technical design documentation.

Location:

• Three days a week at a Guardian location in Stamford, CT, Holmdel, NJ, New York, NY or Bethlehem, PA.

Salary Range:

$118,980.00 - $195,465.00

The salary range reflected above is a good faith estimate of base pay for the primary location of the position. The salary for this position ultimately will be determined based on the education, experience, knowledge, and abilities of the successful candidate. In addition to salary, this role may also be eligible for annual, sales, or other incentive compensation.

Our Promise

At Guardian, you’ll have the support and flexibility to achieve your professional and personal goals. Through skill-building, leadership development and philanthropic opportunities, we provide opportunities to build communities and grow your career, surrounded by diverse colleagues with high ethical standards.

Inspire Well-Being

As part of Guardian’s Purpose – to inspire well-being – we are committed to offering contemporary, supportive, flexible, and inclusive benefits and resources to our colleagues. Explore our company benefits at www.guardianlife.com/careers/corporate/benefits.

Benefits apply to full‑time eligible employees. Interns are not eligible for most Company benefits.

Equal Employment Opportunity

Guardian is an equal opportunity employer. All qualified applicants will be considered for employment without regard to age, race, color, creed, religion, sex, affectional or sexual orientation, national origin, ancestry, marital status, disability, military or veteran status, or any other classification protected by applicable law.

Accommodations

Guardian is committed to providing access, equal opportunity and reasonable accommodation for individuals with disabilities in employment, its services, programs, and activities. Guardian also provides reasonable accommodations to qualified job applicants (and employees) to accommodate the individual's known limitations related to pregnancy, childbirth, or related medical conditions, unless doing so would create an undue hardship. If reasonable accommodation is needed to participate in the job application or interview process, to perform essential job functions, and/or to receive other benefits and privileges of employment, please contact [e-mail]. Please note: this resource is for accommodation requests only. For all other inquires related to your application and careers at Guardian, refer to the Guardian Careers site.

Visa Sponsorship

Guardian Life is not currently or in the foreseeable future sponsoring employment-based visas (e.g., such as an H-1B). In order to be a successful applicant, you must be legally authorized to work in the United States, without the need for employer sponsorship/support now or at any time in the future.

Notice Regarding Guardian’s Use of Artificial Intelligence in Recruitment

As part of Guardian’s job application process, Guardian may use artificial intelligence tools (“AI Tools