Solutions Architect in London

Your mission as a Solutions Architect at Root is to be a Root Platform subject-matter expert across client engagements, translating Root's modular, API-first architecture into optimal solutions for clients across the full client journey at Root. You will have impact and influence from first sales conversations through to delivery and post-live projects. Your performance will be measured against the creativity and effectiveness of your solutions, your ability to build trust and confidence with prospects and clients as well as the degree to which your solutions are aligned to Root’s rails.

You will work closely with our Delivery teams to close the gap between a client's context and Root's capabilities, figuring out how to configure the platform to solve their specific problem in a way that is scalable, realistic, and aligned to Root's rails. Your outputs are working prototypes, architecture diagrams, solution documentation, and a clear handover that sets the Delivery teams up to build with speed and precision and deliver projects on-time and in-budget. You will work closely with Sales, Delivery, Product, Client Success and Engineering to bridge Root’s understanding of client and market needs and what Root delivers.

Becoming technically fluent in building on Root is absolutely essential to being effective in this role. Your onboarding will be a critical time to get hands-on build experience on Root as well as establishing relationships across our client base. Your onboarding will aim to achieve:

• Solid relationships across the client base.
• Comfortable engaging with the decision-maker and the operational teams.
• Able to build a Product Module on Root, end to end.
• Able to architect a complete Root solution, end to end (including integrations, middleware and premium Collection Modules) and translate these solutions into architecture diagrams.
• Able to translate business requirements into Root specifications.
• Comfortable interfacing into Root’s Delivery, Client Success, Product and Engineering functions.
• Understands, embraces and behaves in accordance with Root’s values, ways of work and brand promises.

Outcomes:

• Root feasibility is validated early in the sales cycle.
• Conduct early technical assessments of prospect use cases.
• Flag deal-breakers, constraints, or unreasonable complexity before they become wasted effort.
• Root has a trusted technical voice in sales and design engagements.
• Join technical sales meetings, discovery sessions, and design workshops to answer technical questions, design solutions, and provide implementation insight.
• Build trust with CTOs, underwriters, product and operational leads by explaining how Root works, not just what it does.
• Compelling, relevant demo experiences are built and presented.
• Build and maintain a full suite of product demos, including front-end flows that can be tailored to specific prospects.
• Build and present tailored demos for specific deals where needed.

Solutions are well-architected:

• Solutions for new clients or existing clients are effectively conceptualised and designed using existing Root-rails and tooling to deploy Root’s modular architecture optimally.
• Produce architecture diagrams, solution documentation, and product specifications that are clear, complete, and future-proof.
• Ensure commitments made in sales are realistic, scoped, and understood — with risks, dependencies, and critical assumptions flagged.

Clients experience continuity from sales through design:

• Stay engaged with the client from sales into the implementation phase.
• Direct clients toward Root-aligned best practice and fitting their products onto Root's rails.
• Feed client needs, patterns, and gaps back into Product so the platform evolves in the right direction.

Competencies:

• Platform expertise: Understands how software systems are architected and integrated, and can quickly build deep knowledge of a new platform's capabilities, boundaries, and extensibility.
• Creative solutioning: Comfortable working within product boundaries. Maps prospect requirements to platform capabilities to craft scalable, realistic solutions. Optimises for the client's context, not a generic answer.
• Tactical discovery: Skilled at asking the right questions to uncover technical complexity, integrations, dependencies, and delivery risk early — without instilling doubt or fear.
• Technical presence: Confident and credible in front technical teams, underwriters, product and operational leads. Ability to hold the room.
• Hands-on technical ability: Comfortable enough in JavaScript/TypeScript, APIs to build demos, prototype solutions, and get hands-on in early design and build stages when it sharpens the solution.
• Pragmatic communication: Balances optimism with realism. Explains complex ideas without jargon. Says 'no' constructively.

Qualifications:

• Bachelor's degree in a technical or scientific field (Engineering, Computer Science) or similar.
• Demonstrable coding skills.
• 4+ years in a solutions engineering, sales engineering, or technical implementation role.
• Experience working directly with clients to capture and define requirements.
• Nice to have: experience in the insurance industry.

Root Values:

• Lead by example: “Lean in, take charge, and always set a positive precedent.”
• Exceed expectations: “Know your customer to delight your customer.”
• Rally as one team: “Put aside egos and personal agendas to triumph as one.”
• Own the mission: “Your job is not done until the job is done.”
• Rise to the challenge: “Meaningful change requires meaningful effort and the courage to make bold moves.”