Architecture Manager in London

About Us

We are part of International Airlines Group (IAG), one of the world’s leading airline groups and owner of some of the biggest brands in the sky.

IAG Transform provides creative and innovative solutions to drive sustainable transformation by delivering procurement and airline services, as well as group-wide systems across IAG. Each operating company benefits from the Transform centralised model, driving efficiencies, automation, and economies of scale.

The Architecture Manager is accountable for leading and coordinating the Group’s Generalist Architecture capability, providing people leadership, architectural direction and governance across enterprise and solution architecture disciplines in the enterprise applications and platforms landscape. The role ensures that architectural work undertaken by Principal and Solution Architects is coherent, prioritised, consistently applied and aligned to Group strategy, enterprise standards and delivery needs.
Acting as the primary leadership and escalation point for the Generalist Architecture team, the Architecture Manager balances strategic architectural integrity with pragmatic delivery support across a complex, federated operating environment.
While the role does not specialise in a single technology domain, it is explicitly grounded in the enterprise applications and platforms landscape and is inherently multi-domain and product agnostic—working horizontally across architecture disciplines to ensure that application and platform choices, patterns and integrations support coherent end to end outcomes, align to Group standards, and remain deliverable at scale.

Your responsibilities

Architecture Leadership & Coordination

• Lead, coordinate and prioritise the work of Generalist Principal Architects and Generalist Solution Architects across the Group.

• Ensure clear alignment between enterprise‑level architectural direction and solution‑level design and delivery.

• Act as the primary escalation point for architectural conflicts, trade‑offs or cross‑domain design issues.

• Ensure consistent application of architecture principles, standards and patterns across initiatives.

Enterprise Architecture Oversight

• Own the integrity and coherence of the overall enterprise enterprise applications and platforms architecture landscape through effective use of Principal Architect capability.

• Ensure target states, transition roadmaps and architectural principles are clearly defined, maintained and actively used.

• Identify and address duplication, fragmentation or misalignment across business capabilities and technology platforms.

Solution Architecture Governance & Assurance

• Oversee solution architecture quality and assurance across projects and programmes.

• Ensure architectural risks, constraints and decisions are identified early and managed appropriately through delivery.

• Establish proportionate governance and assurance checkpoints aligned to scale, risk and complexity.

People Leadership & Capability Development

• Provide line management, coaching and performance management for Generalist Principal Architects and Generalist Solution Architects.

• Support professional development, capability uplift and succession planning within the architecture team.

• Foster a collaborative, inclusive and high‑performing team culture.

• Ensure appropriate deployment of architecture resources across the delivery portfolio.

Strategy, Change & Portfolio Support

• Partner with senior technology, delivery and business leaders to align architecture activity with strategic priorities.

• Support major change initiatives by ensuring the right architectural capability is engaged at the right time.

• Balance longer‑term architectural outcomes with immediate delivery pressures.

Stakeholder & Supplier Engagement

• Act as a senior architectural representative with business leaders, programme sponsors and technology leadership.

• Engage with suppliers and partners where architectural leadership or assurance is required.

• Communicate complex architectural issues clearly, pragmatically and in business‑relevant terms.

Architecture Practice & Continuous Improvement

• Own and evolve ways of working for the Generalist Architecture team.

• Promote consistency, reuse and best practice across architecture deliverables.

• Maintain awareness of industry architecture trends and emerging technologies and assess relevance pragmatically.

Essential

• Demonstrable experience operating at Principal / Enterprise / Architecture Leadership level within complex organisations.

• Strong understanding of both enterprise architecture and solution architecture disciplines.

• Proven people leadership experience managing senior specialist roles.

• Proven ability to influence senior stakeholders across business and technology functions.

• Broad architectural understanding across applications, integration, data, infrastructure, cloud, security and services.

• Ability to operate effectively in complex, federated or multi‑operating‑company environments.

Desirable

• Experience leading architecture teams through transformation or modernisation initiatives.

• Experience operating across international organisations and cultures.

• Contribution to architecture standards, communities or best‑practice development.

Personal Attributes

• Enterprise‑minded and able to balance strategic thinking with practical judgement.

• Credible, pragmatic and confident operating at senior levels.

• Comfortable working across ambiguity, change and complexity.

• Collaborative, inclusive and outcomes‑focused leader.

What we offer