Director, Connectivity Architecture (Principal Design Authority)

GSK remains committed to achieving bold commercial ambitions for the future. By 2031, we aim to deliver £40 billion in annual sales, leveraging our existing strong performance momentum to significantly increase our positive impact on the health of billions of patients globally. Our Ahead Together strategy is centred on early intervention to prevent and alter the course of disease, thereby protecting people and supporting healthcare systems. Our diverse portfolio consists of vaccines, specialty medicines, and general medicines. Through continuous innovation and a dedicated focus on scientific and technical excellence, we strive to develop and launch new, groundbreaking treatments that address critical health challenges.

The Director, Connectivity Architecture is GSK's Principal Architect and Design Authority for global connectivity platforms. The role defines, governs and evolves the target‑state connectivity architecture, ensuring major initiatives deliver affordable, secure, resilient, observable and operable outcomes that enable us to unite science, technology and talent to get ahead of disease together. This position provides leadership through architectural authority, standards and governance. It sets the standards for WAN/SD‑WAN, campus LAN/Wi‑Fi, cloud and data centre connectivity, DDI (DNS/DHCP/IPAM), firewalling and Zero Trust access, enabling consistent, scalable delivery across a global, regulated enterprise.

Key Responsibilities

• Own the enterprise connectivity architecture vision, principles and target state aligned to business strategy, security requirements and the digital roadmap.
• Define and maintain global connectivity standards, reference architectures and design patterns across WAN/SD‑WAN, LAN/Wi‑Fi, cloud connectivity, DDI, firewalling and Zero Trust access.
• Act as the authoritative Design Authority for material connectivity decisions—chair architecture reviews, approve high‑impact designs and manage deviations with clear guardrails.
• Embed security by design and segmentation principles into all connectivity designs, ensuring compliance with cybersecurity and regulated environment requirements.
• Define architecture roadmaps that drive simplification, automation, lifecycle management, end‑of‑life remediation and platform standardisation.
• Own non‑functional requirements (NFRs) for operability, observability, resilience, performance and automation, ensuring they are testable and built into delivery templates.
• Provide architectural leadership into RFPs/vendor selection and solution validation; ensure supplier designs adhere to enterprise standards and long‑term value objectives.
• Partner with Operations/SRE to ensure architectures are operationally fit, measurable (telemetry‑first) and supported by clear runbooks and service models.
• Support investment decisions by articulating architectural trade‑offs across cost, risk, resilience, scalability and automation.
• Translate complex architectural decisions into clear, actionable recommendations for senior stakeholders and executive forums.

Why You!

You are a true enterprise architect and design authority, with the credibility to define and govern connectivity at a global scale. What sets you apart is your ability to balance architecture with real‑world delivery—making the right trade‑offs across cost, risk and resilience, while ensuring security is embedded by design.

Required Qualifications, Experience & Skills

• Bachelor's degree in Computer Science, Engineering, Information Systems, or equivalent experience.
• Significant experience in enterprise networking and connectivity, including acting as Principal Architect/Design Authority for large‑scale transformations.
• Deep architectural expertise across SASE, WAN/SD‑WAN, LAN/Wi‑Fi, cloud/hybrid networking, DDI (DNS/DHCP/IPAM), firewalling and Zero Trust access.
• Strong architectural judgement and trade‑off analysis, balancing cost, risk, resilience, performance and automation.
• Proven ability to influence senior stakeholders and delivery teams without direct line management responsibility.
• Experience defining operability/observability by design and working with SRE/Operations to embed NFRs and telemetry standards.
• Comfortable operating across platform‑oriented delivery, agile environments and large multi‑vendor engagements.
• Exceptional communication skills, able to translate complex technical topics into executive decision enablers.

Preferred Qualifications

• Experience in complex, regulated, mission‑critical enterprise environments.
• Working exposure to AI‑driven operations, automation and telemetry platforms for network observability.
• Relevant technical certifications desirable (e.g., Juniper, CCNP/CCIE, cloud networking).

This role is based at our UK HQ in Central London or in our US Upper Providence, Pennsylvania location and operates on a hybrid working model. You will be expected to work on site 2–3 days per week to collaborate with cross‑functional teams and support critical activities.

GSK is an Equal Opportunity Employer. This ensures that all qualified applicants will receive equal consideration for employment without regard to race, color, religion, sex (including pregnancy, gender identity and sexual orientation), parental status, national origin, age, disability, genetic information (including family medical history), military service or any basis prohibited under federal, state or local law. If you require any adjustments to our application process, please contact UKRecruitment.Adjustments@gsk.com.