Solutions Architect

Description:

Company Description

Following years of accelerated growth Culina Group is now a £2.2billion+ turnover business, employing over 22,000 staff, with a fleet of more than 5,000 vehicles. Culina Group operates from over 100+ depots across the UK and Ireland, serving more than 1,000 clients over its framework of chilled, ambient, contract packaging solutions and fresh and baked goods.

Company Overview

Culina Group is a leading UK 3rd party food & drinks logistics provider offering dedicated and shared user warehousing and distribution solutions.

At Culina we have a winning culture, we believe that our culture is one of the reasons our company continues to thrive… A place where you're valued, challenged, and inspired!

Job Description

Due to continued growth, we are now seeking a Solutions Architect (SAP Specialist) to join our IT Department at our Rugby site. 
This role could be based from a number of our midlands based sites including, Rugby, Corby, Banbury or North in Warrington depending on your home location.

As Solutions Architect you will be responsible for collaborating with third-party vendors to ensure the design, development, and implementation of robust solutions, primarily in SAP, align with the strategic goals and requirements of the organisation.

This is a full time, permanent position working Monday to Friday 9am to 5pm offering a competitive salary and package with the opportunity to work for a forward thinking market leader.

Job responsibilities of Solutions Architect (SAP Specialist) include:

Translates business strategy into solutions architecture which defines & develops IT solution/application strategies to enable Culina Group goals
Leads solutions design and develops and implements architectural principles, standards, policies and governance [Enterprise Architecture Design]
Orchestrates solutions delivery and delivers advisory services and assurance to programmes/projects, driving prioritisation of enterprise wide initiatives – ensures deliveries underpin, enable & realise business benefits [Technical Solution Design]
Analyses and evaluates technology whilst driving continuous improvements [Architecture Authority]
Understands business drivers and business capabilities (future and current state) and determines corresponding enterprise system designs and change requirements to drive the organization's targeted business outcomes.
Understands emerging technology trends and disruptions and the practical application of existing, new, and emerging technologies to enable new and evolving business and operating models.
Translates business and technical requirements into an architectural blueprint to achieve business objectives and documents all solution architecture design and analysis work.
Analyses the technology industry, competitors and market trends, and determines their potential impact on the enterprise.
Provides deliverables like standard definitions, reference models and architecture designs to help the architecture review board (ARB) assess the impact of new and ongoing technology investment on the business and IT estate.
Acts as a consultant on a broad range of technologies, platforms and vendor offerings to drive targeted business outcomes.
Leads evaluation, design and analysis for the implementation of a solutions architecture across a group of specific business applications or technologies based on enterprise business strategy, business capabilities, value-streams, business requirements and enterprise standards.
Creates architectural designs to guide and contextualize solution development across products, services, projects and systems (including applications, technologies, processes and information).
Creates reference architectures focused on detailed design principles, decision points, detailed APIs, major systems and dependencies between business and IT.
Analyses the business-IT environment (run, grow and transform the business) to detect critical deficiencies, legacy and technical debt, and recommends solutions for improvement (systems of record, differentiation and innovation).
Designs and directs the governance activities associated with ensuring solutions architecture assurance and compliance.
Defines the principles, guidelines, standards and solution patterns to ensure solution decisions are aligned with the enterprise's future-state architecture vision.
Facilitates the evaluation and selection of software product standards and services, as well as the design of standard and custom software configurations.
Supports product managers in EOL (end of life) product decisions to maintain, refresh or retire products, services or systems (including applications, technologies, processes and information).
Develops a roadmap for the evolution of the enterprise application portfolio from future to current state (as defined by the solutions architecture).
Monitors the current-state solution portfolio to identify deficiencies through aging of the technologies used by the application, or misalignment with business requirements.
Identifies the organizational impact (for example, on skills, processes, structures or culture) and financial impact of the solutions architecture.
Works closely with the product owners and product managers to ensure a robust architectural runway that can support future business requirements throughout the product lifecycle.
Provides consulting support to application architects within agile teams to ensure the project or product is aligned with the overall enterprise architecture.
Consults with application and infrastructure development projects and products to fit systems or infrastructure to architecture and identify when it is necessary to modify projects to accommodate the solutions architecture.
Supports a community of practice (CoP), guiding and helping agile teams, product owners, and application architects to align with the overall enterprise architecture governance and assurance. 

Qualifications

To apply for the role of Solutions Architect (SAP Specialist), you will possess the following skills, experiences and qualifications:

Bachelor's degree in computer science, information-technology, system analysis or a related study, or equivalent experience
Minimum of five years of design and implementation experience in IT, with a deep knowledge in a minimum of two of the following technical disciplines: application development, application programming interfaces (APIs), middleware, database management and cloud technologies
Good experience of IT Architecture (and underlying frameworks such as TOGAF) including the development (and ensuring adherence to) architecture principles and standards
Solid understanding of product management, agile principles and development methodologies and capability of supporting agile teams by providing advice and guidance on opportunities, impact and risks, taking account of technical and architectural debt
Good understanding of strategic and new and emerging technology trends, and the practical application of existing, new and emerging technologies to new and evolving business and operating models
Experience working in a relevant industry is helpful, but not required.
Experience developing architecture blueprints, strategies and roadmaps
Experience delivering presentations to senior-level executives and technical audiences

Additional Information

As part of our drive to make Culina Group a great place to work. We are proud to be an inclusive and diverse organisation where we are committed to employee development and recognising success for hard working performers.

Our dedicated learning and development programmes are open to every employee to give you the opportunity to shape your own future within logistics and continue to work in an environment where team culture thrives.

Our People are the driving force behind our success, which is why we offer a wide range of benefits which include:

Annual Leave – Competitive holiday entitlement of 25 days + 8 bank holiday.
Company Bonus  – We do our best work to succeed together. When we achieve our goals you'll be rewarded through our bonus scheme
Private Medical Cover – This gives you peace of mind, you have choice, flexibility and speed of access to the most clinically appropriate care via Bupa
Car Allowance
Pension scheme – we want colleagues to enjoy a comfortable retirements so we offer a great contribution of 5% employee and 8% employer
Life Assurance -  x4 your annual salary
Wellness – Via our Employee Assistance Programme we offer immediate access to a confidential telephone counselling and legal information service that operates 24 hours a days, 365 days a year
Eye Care Vouchers – We can provide you with substantial savings with free eye tests and discounts on prescription glasses
Reward & Recognition – We recognise that employees have gone the extra mile via Employee of the month and year, special recognition and long service awards.
Everyday discounts - via our benefit platform you will have access to over 50 retailer discounts for everyday savings!If you meet the requirements for the above role and are looking for your next career opportunity please apply now and become a part of our #WinningTeam