Solution Architect in London

Our Head Office department is in the heart of Piccadilly and occupies the 5th & 6th floor of our beautiful flagship store. This central London location offers so much to explore including restaurants, bars, cultural sites, shopping and more, and only a short walk from the Green Park Tube Station and plenty of bus stops. This is a hybrid role, requiring 3 days per week in our Piccadilly Head Office.

The Solution Architect is responsible for shaping, defining and assuring technology solutions that support Fortnum & Mason’s business strategy across retail, hospitality, digital, customer services, data and corporate functions. The role owns the translation of business needs into practical, secure, scalable and supportable solution designs, ensuring each recommendation balances customer and colleague experience, cost, risk, delivery complexity, data quality, cyber security and long-term operational impact. The role will also guide vendor and product selection, challenge assumptions, and help Fortnum & Mason make technology decisions that are commercially sound and fit for the future.

The Solution Architect will play a key role in consolidating Fortnum & Mason’s technology estate, supporting transformation across stores, hospitality, supply chain, eCommerce, customer experience, data and enterprise platforms. This is an opportunity to influence architectural direction in a distinctive heritage brand, working on a varied portfolio that includes packaged applications, cloud services, integrations, data platforms, and emerging AI-enabled and automation capabilities.

This role would suit someone who enjoys working close to the business, can simplify complex technology decisions, and wants to influence architecture in diverse operating models across retail, hospitality, digital, supply chain and central functions. This guide represents a summary of the role, however all team members are expected to be flexible in the work they undertake, which may change from time to time, according to the needs of the business.

Responsibilities

As Solution Architect you will:

• Define and maintain solution architecture across the enterprise, working with leadership teams to ensure alignment with IT strategy, architecture principles, security standards, data governance requirements and operational support models.
• Work closely with business stakeholders, Business Analysts, Project Managers, Digital Transformation Managers, third-party vendors and technology teams to shape solution options, evaluate trade-offs and ensure designs are right sized for Fortnum & Mason.
• Ensure new solutions make appropriate use of data, integration and automation, supporting reliable reporting, data quality, master data principles and responsible use of AI where there is a clear business benefit.
• Assess where AI, analytics or automation can improve customer experience, colleague productivity, operational efficiency or decision-making, while ensuring solutions remain secure, explainable, supportable and aligned to Fortnum & Mason’s governance principles, patterns and standards.
• Lead the selection of new vendors and technology products where required, review third-party designs, create high-level solution designs, support planning and estimation, and provide design assurance through delivery.
• Ensure solutions are implemented as designed, challenge existing thinking where it does not serve the business need, and identify opportunities to reduce complexity, improve resilience, strengthen security and lower long-term cost of ownership for Fortnum & Mason.
• Administer the Design Fortnum’s minutes/actions and technical debt log, ensuring designs adhere to architectural principles.
• Lead new standards and patterns documentation, sharing with relevant teams to ensure standardisation.

Experience and Qualifications

Experience gained in a complex business environment or leading management consultancy, ideally covering several of the following domains: retail, hospitality, supply chain operations, eCommerce, customer platforms, enterprise applications, data and analytics, integration, cloud services, finance, HR or other central services.

TOGAF certification or practical experience using recognised architecture frameworks, design governance, architecture principles and structured decision-making methods.

Familiar with architecture modelling tools and techniques such as C4, ArchiMate, capability mapping, process modelling, integration patterns, data flow mapping and non-functional requirement definition.

Experience assessing data, analytics, automation or AI-enabled solutions, including how they integrate with existing platforms, how data is sourced and governed, and how risks around security, privacy, accuracy, supportability and operational adoption are managed.

Comfortable working across packaged applications, SaaS platforms, bespoke applications, APIs, integrations, cloud services, with the judgement to know when to buy, build, configure, retire or simplify.

Familiar with Microsoft Dynamics, Fabric, Adobe ecommerce, Cloudflare and integration technologies.

Able to work with business stakeholders and communicate complex ideas and solution options in a simple and resonant way.

Experienced with different delivery lifecycles and service delivery methods.

Able to rapidly analyse and understand functions and operation of existing solutions and capabilities of new technologies.

Competencies, Behaviours and Skills

• Prioritise work and remain focused on the most critical tasks, ensuring time and resources are used efficiently and effectively.
• Confident in making evidence-based recommendations, explaining trade-offs clearly, and holding the line on architecture decisions when challenged, while remaining open to new information and better options.
• Able to build strong relationships and credibility.
• Possess excellent communication and interpersonal skills.
• Communicate information in a relevant and concise fashion, mindful of and tailored to the audience.
• A motivated self-starter, enthusiastic, resilient, personally effective, pro-active with a flexible attitude to work.
• Bring strong strategic and analytical problem-solving skills, attention to detail, commercial judgement and the ability to connect technology decisions to business value, customer experience, colleague experience, risk reduction and long-term cost.

We are committed to developing your career and nurturing your talent, regardless of age; disability; gender reassignment; marriage and civil partnership; pregnancy and maternity; race; religion or belief; sex; sexual orientation. We respect and embrace each other's differences, to create a truly inclusive environment. In the last year alone, our people have been recognised and celebrated, winning awards for their outstanding contributions to Retail, Technology, Global Hospitality & Tourism, Visual Merchandising & Display, Customer Service and Local Community Awards.