Solution Architect

From our first store in the 1960s, a little Taunton shop with great clothes and even better prices, to an omni-channel business serving millions of customers… we're New Look. Our purpose is always to inspire That New Look Feeling and we believe that starts with us. Our values motivate us every day: we play to win, we're customer-obsessed and we work as one. It's a busy and exciting time for the brand and we're on the hunt for a Solutions Architect to join our team. The Role: Please note this role needs to be based at our Newcastle under Lyme office Responsible for providing technical solution designs and implementation guidance for complex retail and supply chain programmes. The role works closely with business stakeholders, delivery and support teams as well as the wider architecture community to implement key technologies that deliver cost-effective business change. Senior Solution Architects contribute to the strategy definition and generation of roadmaps for applications in business domains, ensuring a vision for key technologies is understood by stakeholders across the organisation. Responsibilities: Strategy, Governance & Planning

• Establish or improve controls around applications and solution components to ensure they are cost-effective, secure, compliant, performant, scalable and supported.
• Accountable for the technical and commercial viability of proposed solution designs
Responsible for defining and ensuring that solution designs comply with best practice throughout project design, delivery and into support.
• Contribute to the architecture community at New Look through continual development of our artefacts, methodologies and processes, and identification and assessment of new and emerging technologies.
• Establish and communicate a cost-effective and viable vision for applications and their components, managing their evolution through a multi-year roadmap.
Solution Design
• Generate and evaluate commercial and technical options that meet business requirements.
• Support the analysis of business and technical requirements, identifying risks, benefits and opportunities.
• Maintain an accurate set of architectural assets including as-is views, roadmaps, best practices and standards across a range of applications.
• Actively support stakeholders including other architects, technical managers, engineers, testers, and business SMEs to assure the quality of delivered solutions.
• Provide technical leadership for the design of technology solutions.
• Research, understand and provide briefings on technology innovation to internal stakeholders.
• Create and maintain strong relationships with external organisations to establish best practice and technology-fit for the organisation.
• Lead vendor selection activities, engaging stakeholders throughout the process
  
  A degree in IT or related topic, or equivalent industrial experience.
• Previous experience as Architect, Technical Analyst, Senior Engineer on large programmes using both Agile and Waterfall project methodologies.
• Previous experience designing and delivering change in Omnichannel Retail and Supply Chain solutions.
• Experience co-ordinating in-house and 3rd party multi-disciplinary teams, both on-site and offshore.
• Proficiency in methods and techniques for structured reviews, including reviews of key design decisions, non-functional requirements, technical documents, test plans, business cases and other key deliverables.
• Strong interpersonal skills with the ability to work with business stakeholders to establish requirements, inspire others and champion solution ideas, and manage expectations in non-technical language.
• In-depth experience of solution design for on-premise, hybrid or multi-cloud solutions
• Experience establishing and maintaining enterprise-wide policies and standards
• Experience designing and implementing cloud solutions in either Azure, AWS or GCP.
• Understanding of networking standards such as HTTP/S, DNS, BGP
• Understanding of virtualisation and containerisation technologies
• Understanding of IaaC enabling technologies such as ARM or Terraform
• Exposure to observability platforms
  
  The amazing people, the fashion - there are so many reasons to love working at New Look. We prioritise development, offering training to support your progression, so you can be your absolute best and achieve your goals.
Being part of the New Look Team means you get access to a great range of benefits & perks:
• You'll love our generous staff discount - 40% off for you and a loved one, and 25% off for up to 12 friends and family members!
• Get special access to hundreds of discounts from top retailers and gyms, along with free workout classes, on our rewards platform Runway.
• Plan for you retirement while you work with our contributory private pension scheme.
• We're all about celebrating our success, so we have a profit-related bonus scheme.
• Upgrade your commute with our company car allowance - you can use it to buy, lease or fund your current vehicle.
• Our family-friendly policies include enhanced maternity, paternity and adoption leave, and shared parental leave.
• ️ Receive quick access to consultations and treatments with AXA Private Medical Scheme, paid for by us.
Big trip on the cards? Unlock extra leave with our buy more holiday scheme.
• Celebrate YOU! Enjoy an extra paid day off on your birthday each year.
• Do your bit for the environment and save money with our Cycle2Work scheme.
• Spread the cost of your commute with interest-free season ticket loans.
• Running late? No worries, enjoy a free breakfast on us!