Head, Solution Architecture & Standards Office
- Job Type Full Time
- Qualification BA/BSc/HND
- Experience
- Location Lagos
- Job Field ICT / Computer 
About the Role
The Head, Solution Architecture & Standards Office owns the technology architecture, standards, and governance framework that ensures every development initiative across Polaris Bank’s digital and retail banking arms is scalable, secure, and well-integrated. This is a leadership and governance role: you will set direction, define standards, and provide architectural oversight across three specialist domains — Solution Architecture, Security Architecture, and Integration & API Architecture — working through and with specialist architects and leads in each area, rather than executing all specialist work personally.
Key Responsibilities
Governance & Standards
- Define and maintain the enterprise architecture framework, technology standards, and design principles applied across all development initiatives
- Chair architecture review boards; approve or escalate designs that deviate from standards
- Own the technical governance process, ensuring traceability between business requirements and architectural decisions
Solution Architecture
- Oversee the design of end-to-end solutions for major business initiatives, ensuring architectural integrity, scalability, and alignment with enterprise standards
- Guide the application of microservices architecture, domain-driven design, and cloud architecture patterns across teams
- Ensure solution designs are maintainable and support long-term platform evolution
Security Architecture
- Set secure-by-design standards and oversee their application across all solution designs
- Ensure threat modeling, identity & access management design, and cryptographic standards are consistently applied
- Partner with Information Security to ensure architecture decisions meet regulatory and compliance requirements
- Oversee remediation of architecture-level vulnerabilities identified through security assessments
Integration & API Architecture
- Set standards for integration patterns, API design, API gateway usage, and middleware architecture
- Oversee API lifecycle governance to ensure consistency, reusability, and performance across the API portfolio
- Guide adoption of event-driven architecture patterns for high-throughput, real-time use cases
Core Competencies
- Enterprise architecture leadership and technical governance
- Working knowledge across solution, security, and integration architecture disciplines (deep expertise in at least one is expected; working fluency across the others to lead specialist teams credibly)
- Stakeholder management across engineering, security, product, and compliance functions
- Ability to translate business requirements into architectural strategy
Familiarity With Tools (used by the function, not a personal daily requirement)
Enterprise architecture tools (BizzDesign, Sparx EA), Draw.io/Lucidchart, Confluence, JIRA; OWASP tools, Burp Suite, IAM platforms; API gateways, Swagger/OpenAPI, Postman, Mulesoft, Apache Camel, Kafka, RabbitMQ
Qualifications
- Bachelor’s degree in Computer Science, Engineering, or related field; relevant certifications (TOGAF, AWS/Azure Architect, CISSP, or equivalent) an advantage
- Demonstrated track record leading architecture functions in a regulated industry, ideally banking/financial services
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Method of Application
Job Purpose
To drive service quality assurance initiatives, monitor performance metrics, and ensure continuous improvement of IT service delivery.
Key Responsibilities
- Monitor SLA performance and service quality metrics.
- Lead incident and problem management reviews.
- Develop service improvement initiatives.
- Oversee workload automation and process optimization.
- Produce service performance reports for management.
Qualifications
- Bachelor’s Degree in Computer Science, Information Systems, Information Technology, or related discipline.
Experience
- Minimum of 7 years’ relevant experience in IT Operations, Service Management, or Service Assurance.
Certifications
- ITIL Expert
- Lean Six Sigma
- COBIT
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