Senior Data Solutions Architect

About Us
We are the team behind digital retailer Very. Our purpose, helping families get more out of life, powers everything we do. We want our people to get more out of life too! If you are high‑performing, ambitious and make the most of every opportunity, we want to hear from you. In return, you will enjoy heaps of flexibility, great perks and benefits, and the freedom to be yourself, keep learning and take your career wherever you want it to go. If you love making a difference, you will love making it sparkle for millions of Very customers.

About The Role
Working with the Lead Architects in Data and Marketing, you will be responsible for implementing the policies and standards that guide technology delivery, possessing significant experience in modern, cloud‑based technology standards and practices. Solution Architects are involved in designing solutions that are appropriate and fit‑for‑purpose, aligning to both business, technology and data strategies with pragmatic solutions which deliver value for our customers and stakeholders. As Solution Architect you are expected to help shape architectural design and technology roadmaps for complex applications supporting high‑volume, mission‑critical products and services.

The Solution Architect must contribute to strategic thinking and ensure that appropriate technology standards are created and adhered to – including solution designs, strategic alignment, growing technology capabilities, introducing best practice and leading technology selection. The Solution Architect must be an integral part of the Solution Architecture team, working in collaboration with the Lead Architect within a Tribe. Participation in, and contribution to, the Performance Unit and TVG‑wide governance processes and forums is a key element of the role.

You will be experienced in actively addressing the most complicated risks, issues and dependencies, including managing dependencies where ownership exists outside of the team. Solution Architects must have hands-on experience across a broad range of products and services, delivering and managing architecture change throughout the entire product life cycle. As a practitioner in Agile and Lean practices, you will know how to lead complex technology delivery in a fast‑paced environment which is obsessed with continuously improving customer experiences.

You will work hand in hand with our Product Managers, Delivery and Technical Leads to influence and define a technology and data roadmap that meets both our commercial and technology aims. We want to be known as the best in class for this space, so here you can speak and represent the community to large audiences inside and outside of the Very Group. The role also focuses on promotion and leadership of the architectural vision both inside the architecture team and across the wider technology and business teams.

Experience In a Data Domain Is Preferred

• Data and Marketing Architecture Design
  Design and implement modern, cloud‑based data architectures (e.g., data lakes, data warehouses, real‑time streaming platforms, CRM, Campaign Management, Customer Data Platform, Tag management and Ad Tech platforms). Ensure data solutions are designed for performance, scalability, and cost‑efficiency. Define and enforce architectural standards, patterns, and best practices for data.
• Data and Marketing Strategy and Vision
  Support and drive the organisation's data and marketing strategy, ensuring alignment with business goals and long‑term objectives. Develop and maintain a roadmap for data and marketing architecture, focusing on scalability, performance, and innovation. Advocate for a data‑driven culture, enabling teams to leverage data as a strategic asset.
• Bridge the gap between the technical and non‑technical
  You can mediate between people and mend relationships, communicating with stakeholders at all levels.
• Governance
  You can understand how technical governance works with wider governance – for example, budget. You can assure corporate services by understanding important risks and mitigating through assurance mechanisms.
• Making and guiding decisions
  You can make and justify decisions characterised by high levels of risk, impact and complexity. You can build consensus between highly independent and diverse stakeholders.
• Communication Skills
  You can mediate between people with different viewpoints and communicate with stakeholders at all levels. You can manage stakeholder expectations and facilitate discussions about high risk and complexity even within constrained timescales. You can speak and represent the community to large audiences inside and outside of the Very Group.
• Commercial management
  You can identify areas of significance in relation to the technology solution, risks and implications.
• Financial management
  You have experience inputting into business cases that represent both the technology and business benefit associated with the proposed initiative.

Essential Knowledge And Skills

• Proven track record of delivery in both iterative and continuous delivery approaches.
• Expertise in designing high‑quality, data‑centric solutions at conceptual, logical, and physical levels.
• Experience in data analysis and modelling, including designing and maintaining data models at both enterprise and solution levels.
• Ability to operate in a complex stakeholder and technology environment.
• Significant experience building, integrating, maintaining and managing complex data architectures (both build and bought), ideally across multi‑cloud environments.
• Experience and knowledge of the Marketing domain and capabilities – Customer Journey management, digital marketing channel management, marketing campaign management and performance monitoring, marketing funnel optimisation.
• Experience and knowledge of marketing platforms and data pipelines – CRM, marketing automation tools, Customer Data Platforms, analytic tools, tag management and AdTech platforms.
• Expert level solution design experience across the full technology stack, including on‑prem, public and hybrid cloud.
• Expert level experience building, integrating and migrating service/component‑based architectures across modern and legacy platforms.
• Practical experience of successfully delivering change in a lean / agile / DevSecOps environment.
• Ability to lead collaboration and influence decision‑making with strong stakeholder and 3rd‑party management skills.
• Computer Science degree or relevant experience (preferable).
• Background in a hands‑on data engineering role is preferred.
• Large AWS data implementations (S3, EMR, Glue, RDS, etc).
• Apache Iceberg or min Delta lake (DataLake / Lakehouse Architecture).
• Fivetran / CDC such as HVR / AWS Kafka (Data integration and ingestion pipelines).
• Teradata (DWH).
• Nice to have but not essential – Power BI / SAS – DI.