Principal Architect, Delivery

About 3Cloud

At 3Cloud, we foster a culture where experimentation and constructive feedback are encouraged, driving collective growth and delivering outstanding client experiences. We hire individuals who are not afraid to challenge the status quo and hold each other accountable to our core values.

About the Role

As a Principal Architect in Delivery, you will lead the architecture for major Azure programs, bridging business objectives with cloud modernization roadmaps. You will act as an organization-wide technical leader, setting direction, guiding multi-team execution, and translating successful patterns into reusable models. This role involves promoting strong engineering practices, mentoring architects, and building an inclusive, continuously improving engineering culture.

Responsibilities:

Solution Architecture and Technical Leadership

• Lead architecture and technical strategy for large Azure programs, ensuring solutions align with client goals for value, security, scalability, reliability, performance, and cost.
• Define modernization blueprints and reference architectures across applications, platforms, and data.
• Translate business and product strategy into cloud architecture roadmaps and execution plans.
• Guide major architecture decisions, promote shared design standards, and resolve high-impact technical trade-offs.
• Ensure cohesive end-to-end architectures with clear ownership and integration contracts across teams.
• Provide architectural oversight through design reviews and governance, managing cross-cutting concerns.
• Promote modular design, testability, CI/CD, and observability for maintainable systems.
• Leverage AI tools to accelerate discovery, design, code, tests, documentation, and analysis.

Delivery and Consulting Excellence

• Lead executive and senior stakeholder conversations on cloud modernization, platform strategy, and AI adoption.
• Utilize structured problem-solving to shape delivery plans that balance value, cost, speed, and long-term system health.
• Define discovery strategies and lead architecture/steering committee forums.
• Clearly articulate complex strategies to diverse audiences.
• Build trusted relationships with leaders to influence priorities and mature engineering practices.
• Define architecture, discovery, and delivery frameworks for predictable delivery.
• Align teams on shared outcomes, APIs, and operating models.
• Support effective Agile methods at program scale.
• Track risks, technical debt, and architectural drift, recommending adjustments.
• Support opportunity qualification and estimating for high-fit pursuits.

Mentorship and Team Development

• Mentor Senior Architects, Delivery Architects, and senior engineers.
• Provide architectural oversight, modeling pragmatic decision-making.
• Shape career paths and development plans for architects.
• Create and maintain high-leverage learning assets.
• Support hiring and talent development through interview standards and training.
• Set a high bar for executive communication and coach others.
• Help build a culture of psychological safety, inclusion, and continuous improvement.

Growth and Innovation

• Identify and pursue opportunities within client accounts.
• Build executive relationships to expand partnerships.
• Drive sales opportunities as a Pursuit Lead or Technical Solution Lead.
• Partner with sales and leaders to shape technical strategy for strategic pursuits.
• Lead the creation of solution options, architectures, and estimates.
• Operate as a senior technical advisor for multi-track initiatives.
• Identify follow-on and adjacent opportunities.
• Define and evolve reusable assets.
• Champion adoption of modern frameworks, cloud capabilities, automation, and AI-assisted tools.
• Contribute to internal cross-practice initiatives.
• Shape enablement programs and package applied innovation into offerings.

Requirements:

• 12+ years of experience in a primary domain (application development, cloud platform engineering, DevOps, data/analytics) at enterprise scale.
• 7+ years of experience in solution architecture and leading development/engineering teams at program scale.
• 10+ years of experience setting vision and leading enterprise-wide AI/ML adoption strategies.
• Thought leadership and deep expertise in several of the following:
• Agents & Orchestration (Semantic Kernel, LangChain)
• Search & Retrieval (Vector databases, Azure AI Search, Pinecone)
• Evaluation, Quality & LLM Operations
• Responsible AI, Security & Privacy
• AI Platforms & Data Foundations (Azure AI, Databricks, Azure OpenAI)
• Cloud Engineering (APIs, containers, microservices, DevOps)
• Data Integration & Governance
• Analytics & Visualization (Power BI)
• Proven ability to integrate emerging AI frameworks into enterprise solutions.
• Expertise with modern development tools (e.g., GitHub Copilot, Cursor).
• Knowledge of analytics and data science tools, frameworks, and advanced techniques.
• Relevant Azure or Databricks certifications in AI, Data, or Architecture.
• Proven experience leading Azure-based modernization, transformation, AI, or platform programs at enterprise scale.
• Experience defining solution and platform architectures connecting business strategy to scalable technical design.
• Experience leading hybrid and remote teams across time zones.
• Deep understanding of core concepts, languages, frameworks, and design patterns in a primary domain.
• Experience designing and integrating quality, automation, and observability practices at scale.
• Experience using AI-augmented development and integrating AI/ML capabilities into solutions.
• Significant experience in Agile or Scrum environments at scale.
• Proven success in consulting or professional services, including client-facing leadership.
• Familiarity with key Azure services.
• Strong analytical, problem-solving, presentation, and communication skills.
• Commitment to continuous learning in cloud, data, and AI.
• Ability to foster culture, inclusion, and community participation.
• Relevant cloud architecture certifications (Azure-focused or comparable) are strongly preferred.

We encourage you to apply even if your experience doesn't align perfectly with every qualification.
At this time, we cannot sponsor applicants for work visas.

Benefits:

• Flexible work location with a virtual first approach.
• 401(K) with match up to 50% of your 6% contributions.
• Generous PTO.