Systems Architect

Description

The company is a global technology and professional services firm with about 26,000 staff, serving federal civilian, defense and intelligence agencies in more than 50 countries.

This role supports the company's NASA business area and centres on the JPL enterprise IT services, which include 24x7 operations, AI-enabled tools, end-user services, cloud, cybersecurity, and engineering and IT service management teams.

You will design and oversee enterprise architectures across a growing NASA portfolio, shaping solutions that are scalable, secure, interoperable and fit the program's constraints and NASA standards.

You will also help grow the company's NASA account by linking customer priorities to technical solutions and keeping designs aligned with industry practice, federal standards and NASA's digital transformation goals.

The company is looking for a seasoned architect with prior work on NASA JPL or similar federal systems, strong skills in systems integration, enterprise architecture, cloud and infrastructure design, and technical leadership.

Responsibilities

• Gather requirements, constraints and mission objectives from NASA customers, mission partners and internal teams.
• Explain architecture decisions, tradeoffs and solution options to both technical and non-technical audiences.
• Earn trust by delivering well-reasoned, scalable architecture recommendations.
• Lead the creation and rollout of enterprise architectures that follow NASA policy, standards and long-term strategy.
• Analyse complex technical problems and recommend solutions built to last.
• Assess emerging technologies, plan the modernisation of legacy environments, and align capabilities with NASA's digital transformation work.
• Build and maintain end-to-end enterprise architectures, including system designs, integration patterns, data flows and infrastructure models.
• Oversee and validate system design and implementation across development, operations and engineering teams.
• Find and resolve system risks, gaps and dependencies, ensuring resilience, scalability and performance.
• Make sure all architectures meet NASA, NIST, federal IT and cybersecurity standards.
• Produce architecture documentation, including diagrams, roadmaps, specifications and interface definitions.
• Track performance, technical metrics and architectural alignment across projects, and turn the data into recommendations.
• Assess how emerging technologies apply to future program and system architectures.

Requirements

• Bachelor's degree and at least 5 years of experience in systems architecture, enterprise architecture or technical leadership.
• Extensive experience in the NASA JPL environment or comparable federal mission systems, including designing solutions for JPL requirements.
• Strong communication skills, with the ability to explain complex concepts to varied audiences and lead technical discussions.
• Proven record of leading technical teams, guiding development and engineering staff, and mentoring people in architecture practice.
• Experience designing and managing system architectures, producing diagrams and technical documentation, and tracking architecture performance.
• Demonstrated work implementing modern technologies, integrating legacy systems and driving innovation in enterprise settings.
• Ability to obtain a Public Trust clearance.
• Desired: experience with ServiceNow.
• Complex systems, systems architecture and technical leadership experience. No certifications are required. US citizenship is not required.

Conditions

The role is onsite in Pasadena, CA, and you must live in the area. No relocation assistance is provided.

Visa sponsorship is not available for this position.

The role is 40 hours per week, with 10-25% travel.

No current clearance is needed, but you must be able to obtain a Public Trust clearance (NACI T1).

The likely salary range is $162,037 to $219,227. Pay is set by experience, location and possibly contract terms, so it may fall outside this range and is not guaranteed.

Hiring includes biometric identity verification, and you must be on camera for virtual interviews.

Equal opportunity employer, including individuals with disabilities and protected veterans.

Benefits

• Medical plans, some with Health Savings Accounts, plus dental and vision plans.
• 401(k) with pre-tax and post-tax contributions up to IRS limits and a company match.
• Full flex work weeks where possible.
• Paid vacation, sick and personal time, holidays, paid parental, military, bereavement and jury duty leave.
• Short-term and long-term disability, life, accidental death and dismemberment, personal accident, critical illness and business travel accident insurance, provided or available.