Director, Engineering and Architecture

Director – Engineering and Architecture

Job Summary:

Americo is seeking a dynamic leader to join our Engineering and Architecture division. The Director – Engineering and Architecture is responsible for both hands-on technical leadership on the most critical projects, and creating the detailed architecture for Americo. This person will create an architecture review process and a virtual architecture team made up of part-time members from various teams. The Director will possess a natural curiosity and exploration to the root cause of a technical issue. This individual will have an expectation of excellence from fellow Americo team members and elevate our engineering efforts to top-tier production.

The scope includes:

• Coordination and assimilation of the work related to all platforms and technologies to result in a holistic development plan for Americo.
• Preparation, participation, and potential leadership of the IT Steering Committee, Architecture Design, Performance Indicator Review (PIR), Project Resourcing, and other meetings.
• Discovery, design, and production of an Enterprise Architecture to include Business, Application, Data, and Technology Architectures.
• Technical leadership and delivery of the most critical projects and training a pool of resources to do the same on the remaining projects.

Essential Responsibilities:

• Technical leadership delivering the most critical projects. Involving the right experts, driving timely decisions, finding the best way to solve business goals.
• Ownership of building and updating our standard architectural solutions and approaches, appropriately communicating and enforcing these standards, and attending relevant meetings to help deploy the standards.
• Coordinating the efforts of the part-time architects/engineers across various areas to deliver the above tasks.
• Training others to perform that role on smaller projects.

Essential Knowledge, Skills, and Abilities:

• Direct project management experience, disciplined use of SDLC for Agile and Waterfall projects, experience with project work management tools such as Azure Dev Ops, Planview, etc.
• Managing multiple initiatives concurrently.
• Ability and willingness to maintain current knowledge on trends and practices within the technology industry. Confidence to bring new ideas and practices into Americo.
• Vendor experience related to qualifying, negotiating, and holding accountable to contractual terms and agreements.
• Sense of urgency and educated judgment of when to intervene with anomalies in the operation of the solutions. Diplomacy and crisp communication to executive management as well as to impacted user groups.
• Experience creating, communicating, and executing architectures.

Americo: We’re in this for life!

The roots of the Americo family of companies date back more than 100 years. Americo is a life insurance and annuity company providing innovative products to our customers. At Americo, it’s the people who make things work, so we hope you join us!

What you’ll love about working at Americo:

• Compensation: You’ll feel valued with our competitive pay and robust bonus program that’s offered to all associates.
• Learning and development: We prepare you with a comprehensive, paid training program that will get you ready for success. Additionally, our Talent Development team creates a variety of development opportunities for associates at every stage of their careers.
• Work-life balance: We place true value on work-life balance with our generous paid time off; you begin accruing hours right off the bat every month and it increases with tenure. Americo also offers 11 paid company holidays! We also support new mothers with a generous maternity leave program, along with paid STD and LTD.
• Health and well-being: We commit to your health and well-being and are proud to offer comprehensive health and life insurance options including FSA or HSA accounts and subsidies to support your health and fitness goals through vendor partnerships at The Y, Orange Theory, WW, and more.
• Future planning: Americo offers a 401(k) with a company match, and we provide child care and education tax credits or savings options.
• Giving back: We support several local organizations like Ronald McDonald House, Hope Lodge, the American Red Cross, Harvesters, and many more. Our associates volunteer their time and donate money alongside the company to make a difference in our community.
• The fun stuff: Americo participates in the Kansas City Corporate Challenge, and it’s a great way to connect with coworkers. Additionally, we host events like a Royals Party at the K, a legendary Holiday Party, and in-office events with local vendors as a way for associates to step away from work and enjoy each other’s company.
• Bustling environment: Our newly renovated offices are conveniently located in downtown Kansas City, within walking distance to your favorite restaurants and attractions. Plus, you’ll receive complimentary paid parking near our Americo offices – downtown parking is a premium, but we’ve got you covered.