Senior Director of Information Architecture

In an uncertain world, Travelers is an insurance leader, committed to keeping pace with the ever-changing needs of our customers, and anticipating their needs for the future. There is no stronger testament to our dedication to protecting customers from loss than our continued innovation and ability to transform our industry.

The Travelers Business Insurance Architecture group is looking for a Portfolio Architect to work directly with the Strategic Business Intelligence Services (SBIS)/Business Insurance Business Intelligence (BI BI) Portfolio. The Portfolio Architect is focused on the architecture vision and roadmap for the suite of capabilities within a given Business Insurance portfolio. Although this role is accountable to Business Insurance Architecture, the incumbent will be specifically dedicated to SBIS/BI BI, the area responsible for the data warehouse and business intelligence solutions within the Business Insurance division of Travelers. This is a visible role and a key leader in Business Insurance, and participates in defining the business strategy and portfolio's suite of capabilities. The primary duty of this role is to provide architectural guidance, technological recommendations and transition strategies that support the development and implementation of new applications within the SBIS/BI BI portfolio. This role is also responsible for the continued maturity of the architecture practice within the SBIS/BI BI portfolio. Visibility and interaction with senior level audience and membership on the Architecture Review Board are also associated with this role.

* Focus on delivering the architecture vision and roadmap for the suite of capabilities within the SBIS/BI BI portfolio. * Accountable for all architecture decisions made within the SBIS/BI BI portfolio. * Provide architectural strategic thinking, solutions and roadmaps while driving architectural recommendations. * Focus on meeting the needs of the portfolio while demonstrating accountability to Business Insurance Architecture. * Provide software architecture leadership to the organization. Take a lead role in the continued rollout and maturity of the architecture practice within the SBIS/BI BI portfolio. * Maintain a plan to address significant architecture gaps between current and target state. * Lead reuse, buy and build decisions. * Manage a small team of individual contributor information architects/modelers. * Ensure architectural compliance of solutions and introduce recommendations for changes to reference models when needed. * Work within the SBIS/BI BI portfolio to develop, communicate and mentor others on design and implementation standards, guidelines and best practices. * Collaborate with business leaders to determine how to best use technology to enable growth and success. * Participate in developing architecture resource strategy, operating model and resource plans to ensure effective and sustainable architecture function, as well as effective resource coverage to support all Business Insurance portfolios and functions. * Participate in defining and driving the development of the architecture competencies, processes and practices across Business Insurance. * Participate in cross-organizational performance reviews of employees who perform project architecture work. * Contribute to the growth of the Business Insurance architecture practice through mentoring candidates in project teams. In addition to working with individual projects, the Portfolio Architect will work on a number of initiatives managed by the Business Insurance Architecture office. The incumbent may participate in developing the strategy and tactics for the renovation and replacement of legacy software components as Travelers transitions to a service- and process-oriented architecture. This role will work with colleagues to establish and maintain methods and best practices for software architecture, to extend and refine Travelers’ reference models, and to keep current on standards, techniques, tools and enabling technologies.

Qualified candidates will have the following skills and experience: Minimum of 12 years work experience in enterprise, application, and information architecture design * Minimum of 7 years work experience in application development * 4-year degree in a related field (or equivalent experience) * Strong technical skills in data warehouse and business intelligence * Minimum of 3 years of experience in people, product and/or project management * Experience working in a matrix organization. * Experience working with a structured architecture process * TOGAF (or similar) certification preferred * Subject matter expertise is requested in the following areas: enterprise architecture and architecture planning; architecture repository (architecturally significant assets and major interrelationships); data warehouse; business intelligence tools; middleware technologies (mainly ETL and also including ESB and messaging); service oriented architecture; application integration; development platforms (.NET, J2EE); and modeling languages (ERD, UML, etc.) **Technical Knowledge** The Portfolio Architect should have at least 15 years of experience delivering large, enterprise systems, particularly when some or all of it involved data warehouse and business intelligence. Other qualifications include: * Experience in SOA and/or XML * Has a solid working knowledge of capabilities and direction of technology, coupled with an in-depth knowledge of the technology required and the needs of business environment necessary to support assigned projects **Problem Solving and Decision Making** The Portfolio Architect must openly debate and defend solution recommendations on component coupling and cohesion, interface design, component models, implementation technologies, and architectural reference models and patterns. Other qualifications include: * Team Orientation * This role maintains partnerships across the organization, and is able to influence senior management, peers and staff through an inclusive style and recognition of their abilities to achieve results. Other qualifications include: * Recognition that the success of the team is above personal interest * Ability to establish effective, cross-functional relationships with members of other business, IT and leadership teams **Self-Management** This role manages functional objectives and priorities supporting multiple assigned business units. Responsibilities are assigned with a great amount of latitude for setting priorities and decision-making using generally accepted guidelines. Results are reviewed with next level manager for clarification according to predefined objectives. **Commitment to Quality Result** The Portfolio Architect creates an atmosphere where business partners’ issues are dealt with professionally and in a timely manner. This role suggests solutions that make sense and are in line with future technology direction. Other qualifications include: * Communicates openly and effectively in a manner consistent with the audience * Demonstrates an adaptive style that is flexible and effective in gaining cooperation of others * Anticipates and responds to management requests for information with timely, accurate findings * Advocates for the business, contributes opinions and influences others’ opinions through excellent verbal and written communication. * This role collaborates with IT and business leaders to determine how to best use technology to enable growth and success. * Identify and Manage Architecture Risks * This role demonstrates the ability to see through a complex problem to find what parts of the problem pose the most architecture risk. Once risks are identified, this role demonstrates the ability to determine solutions and/or mitigation plans for those risks. * Stakeholder Management * This role must develop a good understanding of the most important stakeholders and record this analysis for reference and refresh during the project. The incumbent must be able to win support from senior leaders regarding the architecture concepts being promoted. * Planning and Project Management * This role develops operational plans and provides resource estimation for task planning. Proposes action plans that are timely, realistic and positive. Sets appropriate goals for projects and monitors progress against the plan.