Solutions Architect at Co-operative Bank of Kenya

What is redefining the Banking business locally and globally is the customer centered approach in solution architecture and development, letting the customer decide what they want to achieve as they do business as well as the services and products they desire to have.

Are you highly innovative, always redefining the way of doing things? Are you agile and very passionate about technology and what it can deliver to meet customer needs?

Do you have a customer centric attitude in your experience as a Solutions Architect? Does it excite you to keep making improvements, innovating and delivering new products and services driven by the customer need? Do you possess a deep understanding of ICT architectural concepts and the fundamentals of good software design and the ability to deliver innovative solutions and make sound qualitative judgments on appropriateness and the effectiveness of solution approaches? Join us at Co-operative Bank and be part of the Digital Transformation journey where opportunities are limitless.

Reporting to the Head – Enterprise Architecture, the role holder is intended to provide detailed technical analysis of business requirements to provide the end to end solution to a business need, Provide the projects solutions approach by building software and integration technical designs to ensure they are in line with the enterprise architectural plan in collaboration with Enterprise Architects, Application Architects and Data Architects.

The role holder will also provide input to the strategic direction of technology investments to assist in the development of the enterprise architecture and maximize the return on technology investment. The Solution Architect will also provide technical support with existing and occurring enhancements with respect to effort estimation and impact assessment as well as identify system, infrastructure and project interdependencies and balance competing demands to ensure project deliverables are achieved.

The role

The successful jobholder will be expected to:

• Use appropriate tools, including logical models of components and interfaces, to contribute to the development of systems architectures in specific business or functional areas.
• Produce detailed component specifications and translates these into detailed designs for implementation using selected products.
• Provide advice on technical aspects of system development and integration (including requests for changes, deviations from specifications, etc.) and ensure that relevant technical strategies, policies, standards and practices are applied correctly. Provide input to the strategic direction of technology investments to assist in the development of the enterprise architecture to maximize the return on technology investment, participate in governance/stewardship of Service Oriented Architecture (SOA) artifacts and definitions, including enterprise services, data, business events/topics, contracts and associated publish/subscribe participants.
• Specify and design large or complex systems, select appropriate design standards, methods and tools, consistent with agreed enterprise and solution architectures and ensures they are applied effectively.
• Review others' systems designs to ensure selection of appropriate technology, efficient use of resources, and integration of multiple systems and technology
• Evaluate and undertake impact analysis on major design options and assess and manage associated risks and ensure that the system design balances functional, service quality and systems management requirements.
• Contribute to selection policy for architecture components, weigh alternatives and identify the most effective solutions taking into account wider business context, explore a range of possibilities and creative alternatives to contribute to systems, process and business improvements and finally implement systems and processes that underpin high quality research and analysis.
• Monitor the market to gain knowledge and understanding of currently emerging technologies, identify new and emerging hardware and software technologies and products and potential value to the organization.
• Document policies, procedures and reference architectures on Intranet and communicate updates to appropriate staff. Provide best practice recommendations for project implementation and designing policies and procedures to support the recommendations.
• Attend code reviews to ensure that platform-specific standards and best practices are followed.
• Provide team support in project delivery; systems development, solution architecture Design, architecture reviews, architecture assessment, component development, ICT tools evaluation, vendor review, employs modeling as a framework; mentorship guidance, manage team expectations, organize for one on one sessions and manage communication within the team with regard to timely project updates.
• Ensure that the solution architectures align with the roadmaps established by enterprise architecture, and that they adhere to the enterprise architecture principles.

Qualifications, Skills & Attributes

The successful jobholder will be required to possess the following qualifications: -

• Bachelor’s degree in Computer Science, IT, Statistics, Actuarial Science and/or related fields
• 4 years’ professional experience in IT solution architecture, development of APIs on Enterprise service bus/SOA experience is desirable
• Solid grasp of design patterns and principles, particularly Object-Oriented Design (OOD), Service-Oriented Architecture (SOA) and Event-Driven Architecture (EDA).
• Excellent software development skills – Java, Spring framework, JBoss, Websphere Application Server, C#, Oracle databases, SQL server, DevOps, SOA/ESB, Cloud based solutions, Android, REST, XML/RPC, CORBA, Business process management (BPM), Active MQ, Kannel
• Experience on systems like Mobile money transfer, USSD/SMS, ERP, CRM, core banking system and other systems in a financial services ecosystem.
• Familiarity with Unified Modeling Language (UML) and possesses knowledge of ancillary technologies in use at, such as Java, MS SQL server, Eclipse, Oracle, or an ability to quickly learn any of these if needed.
• Possesses a strong customer service attitude, excellent communication skills, exhibits a passion for learning and continuous improvement. Takes responsibility for acquiring new skills and broadening knowledge
• Exhibits a commitment to the utilization of defined standards and processes with entrepreneurial flair with strong business acumen.
• High level of mathematical aptitude and strong problem-solving skills, logical, analytical and investigative mind, together with creative abilities, A wild duck - out of the box thinker.
• Ability to handle complex information with accuracy and attention to detail.