First seen by Alion on Oct 21, 2026.
SUMMARY:
ESSENTIAL SKILLS:
- Mainframe & Modernisation
- Deep understanding of enterprise mainframe architectures and application landscapes.
- Strong experience in mainframe-to-cloud modernisation and migration.
- Strong working knowledge of IBM DB2 and IMS.
- Understanding of COBOL, PL/I, Java and J2EE environments.
- Experience analysing legacy applications, dependencies, interfaces, data flows and integration points.
- Ability to define modernisation strategies including refactoring, replatforming, decoupling and application redesign.
- Experience designing repeatable migration patterns suitable for a migration factory approach.
- Cloud & Architecture
- Strong AWS cloud architecture experience.
- Experience defining target architectures, reference architectures, architectural principles and solution patterns.
- Strong understanding of cloud-native and distributed application architectures.
- Experience with AWS Blu Age or equivalent automated mainframe transformation approaches.
- Knowledge of AI-enabled software engineering and its application within legacy modernisation.
- Strong understanding of service-oriented, modular and decoupled architectures.
- Experience designing for scalability, availability, resilience, security and operational supportability.
- Integration & Data
- Strong enterprise system integration architecture experience.
- API design and OpenAPI principles.
- Event-driven architecture.
- Kafka and Pub/Sub integration patterns.
- Mainframe-to-cloud data migration and synchronisation.
- Change Data Capture concepts and technologies.
- Experience integrating modernised applications with legacy and cloud platforms.
- Engineering & Automation
- Strong understanding of modern software engineering and DevOps practices.
- Java and modern application development principles.
- CI/CD and automated delivery concepts.
- Infrastructure as Code principles.
- Experience with Terraform and/or AWS CloudFormation.
- Git and Maven.
- Container technologies including Docker, Kubernetes and/or OpenShift.
- Linux/Unix environments and shell scripting.
- Automated testing, system integration testing and parallel-run approaches.
- Chief Expert / Architecture Leadership
- Ability to establish technical direction across a complex modernisation programme.
- Ability to translate modernisation strategy into executable architecture and engineering standards.
- Ability to make and govern complex architectural decisions across multiple applications and delivery teams.
- Ability to develop reusable architectural patterns rather than application-specific solutions.
- Strong technical leadership and engineering mentoring capability.
- Ability to evaluate emerging technologies through proofs of concept and translate outcomes into production architecture.
- Ability to communicate complex technical decisions to senior management, Product Owners and engineering teams.
- Strong stakeholder management and ability to drive technical alignment across multiple organisations
- Experience with AWS Transform for mainframe / AWS Re:Imagine.
- Practical experience with AWS Blu Age.
- Experience applying AI-assisted or AI-native software engineering techniques to application modernisation.
- Experience with automated source-code analysis, business-rule extraction and specification generation.
- Experience establishing or scaling a mainframe migration factory.
- Experience modernising large enterprise application portfolios.
- Experience running multiple modernisation approaches in parallel.
- Practical experience transitioning from legacy architectures towards microservices and cloud-native architectures.
- Serverless architecture and AWS Lambda.
- AWS services such as S3 and Glue.
- Experience with Payara and/or Quarkus.
- Experience working with IBM IIB or comparable enterprise integration technologies.
- Test-driven development and automated unit/integration testing.
- Experience working in large-scale Agile delivery environments.
- Experience working with globally distributed engineering teams and external technology partners.
- Experience coaching architects and senior engineers.
- German language capability advantageous.
- Experience working within regulated or highly governed enterprise IT environments.
POSITION INFO:
RESPONSIBILITIES: Technical Strategy & Architecture Own and evolve the technical architecture for the Mainframe Migration Service. Define the target architecture for mainframe-to-cloud modernisation. Establish architecture principles, standards, patterns and guardrails for migration teams. Define reusable reference architectures that can be applied across multiple migration initiatives. Ensure architectural consistency across legacy, integration, cloud and modern application landscapes. Guide technical decisions regarding the appropriate modernisation approach for different application characteristics. Ensure architecture supports long-term maintainability and does not simply recreate legacy complexity in the cloud. Modernisation Capability Lead the technical establishment and industrialisation of the AWS Re:Imagine \/ AWS Transform modernisation capability. Ensure architectural alignment between the emerging Re:Imagine capability and the established AWS Blu Age migration approach. Define how multiple modernisation paths can operate within a common migration service. Evaluate new modernisation technologies and approaches through structured POCs. Convert successful POC outcomes into governed, repeatable production patterns. Identify architectural constraints, technical risks and dependencies early in the migration lifecycle. Migration Architecture Define application and data migration architecture. Establish approaches for legacy application analysis, decomposition and decoupling. Define cloud landing-zone and application deployment architecture appropriate to migrated workloads. Define patterns for migration of DB2 and IMS-based applications. Define integration and coexistence patterns between mainframe and modernised applications. Define data synchronisation and Change Data Capture patterns where parallel operation is required. Support migration testing, system integration, parallel running and production implementation activities. Engineering Enablement Establish reusable engineering patterns supporting faster migration delivery. Drive automation across build, test, deployment and infrastructure provisioning. Define technical quality standards and architecture acceptance criteria. Guide engineering teams on cloud-native architecture and modern software engineering practices. Reduce application-by-application reinvention by establishing standard solutions that can be reused across the migration portfolio. Mentor architects and engineers and facilitate technical knowledge transfer. Ensure knowledge is institutionalised within the organisation rather than concentrated within individual suppliers or resources. Technical Governance Lead significant technical and architectural decisions affecting the migration service. Conduct architecture and system design reviews and identify required improvements. Ensure solutions remain aligned with enterprise architecture, security and integration requirements. Establish architectural decision records and technical standards where appropriate. Identify technical debt and architectural risks before they impact migration delivery. Balance architectural governance with the need for delivery speed. Stakeholder & Delivery Alignment Work closely with the Product Owner and Delivery Manager to translate strategy into executable technical roadmaps. Provide technical options and recommendations for future technology decisions. Translate business and migration requirements into implementable architecture. Collaborate with application teams, architecture, infrastructure, cloud, security and integration stakeholders. Collaborate with external suppliers and technology partners during POCs and implementation activities. Present architectural decisions, risks, trade-offs and recommendations clearly to technical and non-technical stakeholders. Support migration planning, technical estimation and dependency identification. Provide technical guidance to enable the migration capability to scale across multiple delivery teams. QUALIFICATIONS\/EXPERIENCE: Relevant university degree in Computer Science, Information Technology, Software Engineering, Computer Engineering or a related discipline. Alternatively, demonstrable equivalent senior-level enterprise architecture and software engineering experience. Relevant cloud and architecture certifications are advantageous. 10+ years' relevant professional experience in enterprise IT, software engineering or technology architecture. This aligns with the minimum experience requirement in the existing specification. Significant experience working as a Solution Architect, Technical Architect, Enterprise Architect or equivalent senior technical role. Proven experience architecting complex enterprise solutions. Proven experience in mainframe modernisation and mainframe-to-cloud migration. Practical experience working with legacy mainframe technologies such as DB2, IMS, COBOL and PL\/I. Strong practical experience with AWS or comparable hyperscale cloud environments. Proven experience defining target architectures and reference architectures. Experience taking architecture from concept or POC through to production implementation. Experience with enterprise system integration and complex application dependencies. Experience with modern software engineering, automation and DevOps practices. Experience providing technical leadership across multiple teams and disciplines. Demonstrated experience mentoring and developing engineers and architects. Experience influencing technical direction across organisational boundaries. Experience translating complex technical strategy into executable delivery. Experience communicating architecture and technology decisions to senior stakeholders. Experience working with external suppliers and technology partners. Experience working across geographically distributed teams. Ability to work independently and take accountability for complex technical topics. Strong written, verbal and presentation capability. Willingness and ability to travel internationally where required, consistent with the existing role specification. Submit your CV to: and Subject line Role title

