{"id":581380,"url":"https://alion.io/job/knowledge-city-2020-lead-software-architect","title":"Lead Software Architect","company":{"id":1864289,"name":"KnowledgeCity","domain":"knowledgecity.com","url":"https://alion.io/company/knowledgecity-com","size_band":null,"is_staffing_agency":false,"employer_type":"direct","is_intermediary":false,"listed_via":null,"ats_vendor":"Greenhouse","truth_index":{"grade":"A","score":89,"open_postings":11,"ghost_share":0,"stale_share":0.455,"repost_share":0,"time_to_fill_p50_days":null,"computed_at":"2026-10-29T05:49:05Z"}},"role":"Backend","role_family":"Backend","seniority":"lead","employment_type":null,"work_mode":"on_site","remote_scope":null,"remote_scope_basis":null,"remote_working_hours":null,"hiring_geo_confidence":"structured","locations":["Pakistan"],"countries":["PK"],"hiring_countries":[],"hiring_countries_total":0,"salary":null,"salary_estimate":{"min_usd":18500,"max_usd":54000,"period":"year","method":"global_role_cell_scaled_by_country","sample_n":2257},"experience_years_min":18,"visa_sponsorship":false,"relocation_package":false,"has_equity":false,"technologies":[{"name":"AWS","optional":false},{"name":"GraphQL","optional":false},{"name":"gRPC","optional":false},{"name":"LLM Guardrails","optional":false},{"name":"Prompt Engineering","optional":false},{"name":"Rest API","optional":false}],"status":"live","first_seen_at":"2026-08-24T13:36:48Z","employer_posted_date":"2026-10-06","last_verified_at":"2026-10-29T08:35:58Z","board_verified":true,"closed_at":null,"days_open":65,"trust":{"level":"ok","repost_count":1,"flags":[],"days_open":65},"description":"Owns the architecture function for the Technology Division. Sets the division-wide technical direction the target architecture, the technology radar, the non-functional envelopes (performance, cost, security, reliability) that every system must live inside and holds the Software Architects accountable to it. Where the Software Architect governs how code is written, the Lead Software Architect governs what gets built, how systems fit together, and which architectural bets the division makes.\nDoes not write code. Owns the Architect agent and is accountable for the quality of every architecture artefact the agent produces across all domain teams - system designs, integration contracts, data models, migration plans. Chairs the Architecture Review Board, is the final decision-maker on cross-domain design disputes and build-versus-buy calls, and is the escalation point when the Software Architect cannot resolve a question inside their own scope.\nActs as the technical counterpart to the Head of Engineering on planning and risk: translates product strategy into an architecture roadmap, surfaces the architectural cost of proposed work before it is committed, and owns the division technical debt position.\nKey Responsibilities\nArchitecture Strategy and Ownership\nDefine and maintain the division target architecture and the architecture roadmap that gets us there\nOwn the technology radar: which languages, frameworks, datastores, and platforms are adopt, trial, assess, or hold\nSet non-functional requirement envelopes - latency, throughput, availability, unit cost, data residency - and enforce them at design time\nOwn build-versus-buy-versus-agent decisions for platform-level capabilities\nMaintain the Architecture Decision Record corpus as the division source of truth for why things are the way they are\nCross-Domain System Design\nOwn the system-of-systems view: service boundaries, integration contracts, event flows, and shared data models across all domain teams\nArbitrate cross-domain design disputes and boundary ownership questions\nReview and approve designs for anything that crosses a domain boundary, touches shared infrastructure, or introduces a new external dependency\nOwn architecture-level migration and decommissioning plans for legacy systems\nArchitect Agent Ownership\nOwn the Architect agent - define, train, and continuously improve its skills so it produces designs that conform to the target architecture and NFR envelopes\nEncode architectural guardrails, decision heuristics, and rejection criteria into the agent so non-compliant designs are caught before human review\nAudit Architect agent output through structured spot checks; feed findings back into agent skills\nSet the standard for how the Software Architects operate their agents, and review their agent skill definitions\nLeading the Architecture Function\nLine-manage, coach, and develop the Software Architects\nChair the Architecture Review Board; set its cadence, entry criteria, and decision rights\nEnsure the Software Architect coding standards stay coherent with the target architecture\nOwn architecture onboarding and levelling for the function; grow the bench\nRisk, Debt, and Governance\nOwn the division technical debt register: quantify it, prioritise it, and negotiate paydown into the roadmap\nPartner with the Information Security and GRC Lead on security-by-design and threat modelling at the architecture layer\nPartner with the Infrastructure Manager and Platform Lead on capacity, cost, and reliability architecture\nPartner with the QA Lead on testability as an architectural property\nReport architecture health, risk, and debt position to the Head of Engineering and the Technology Division Manager\nMust Have:\n18+ years of experience \nExpert in software architecture, design patterns, and SaaS application design\nExpert in API and integration contract design (REST, GraphQL, gRPC, event-driven) and data architecture and modelling\nExpert in non-functional requirements engineering - performance, reliability, and cost\nAdvanced cloud, platform, and security architecture, including threat modelling - AWS required, OCI a strong plus\nExpert in architecting agent configuration and training, with advanced agent skill design, guardrail engineering, and prompt engineering for system design\nExpert in technical decision-making and arbitration, with advanced experience leading senior technical individuals and negotiating roadmap with stakeholders\nExpert in architecture documentation and ADRs, with advanced executive communication of technical risk","description_format":"text","description_chars":4554,"description_truncated":false,"requirements":{"experience_years_min":18,"management_years_min":null,"team_size_min":null,"manages_managers":false,"education":null,"security_clearance":false,"languages":[]},"benefits":[],"hiring_locations":[],"hiring_excludes":[],"relocation_offered":false,"industries":["Artificial Intelligence","Education","Government"],"lifecycle":[{"event":"open","at":"2026-09-09T22:39:01Z"},{"event":"close","at":"2026-09-14T15:08:01Z"},{"event":"reopen","at":"2026-10-23T22:14:01Z"}],"visa":[],"liveness":{"score":14,"band":"cold","label":"Long shot","p_open":1,"p_active":0.512,"p_room":0.28,"age_days":65,"expected_fill_days":27,"reasons":["conf:1","win:tail","crowd:"],"computed_at":"2026-10-29T05:49:05Z"},"pay":null,"html_url":"https://alion.io/job/knowledge-city-2020-lead-software-architect","json_url":"https://alion.io/job/knowledge-city-2020-lead-software-architect.json","meta":{"generated_at":"2026-10-29T12:56:53Z","cache_seconds":300,"methodology":"https://alion.io/methodology","terms":"https://alion.io/terms","contact":"https://alion.io/contact","api":"https://alion.io/developers","about":"Alion is a live layer of people, companies and AI agents: who they are, whether they are real and active right now, what they do and how to work with them, readable by people and by agents and paid per call.","catalog":"https://alion.io/catalog.json","usage":{"tier":"crawler_verified","counted_by":"address","units_charged":1,"used_today":19498,"day_limit":null,"remaining_today":null,"minute_limit":300,"resets_at":"2026-10-30T00:00:00Z"}},"offers":[{"id":"company.slices","title":"One company in depth, by slice","status":"live","price":{"credits":0.02,"usd":0.002,"plus_per_slice":{"credits":0.05,"usd":0.005}},"unit":"per company, plus each slice with data","note":"the employer in depth","call":{"mcp_tool":"get_company","arguments":{"id":1864289},"rest":"https://alion.io/mcp/rest/get_company?id=1864289"},"human":"https://alion.io/catalog?offer=company.slices&for=job%2Fknowledge-city-2020-lead-software-architect"},{"id":"market.stats","title":"A market slice: pay, demand and time to fill","status":"live","price":{"credits":1,"usd":0.1},"unit":"per slice","note":"pay, demand and time to fill for this role and place","call":{"mcp_tool":"market_stats"},"human":"https://alion.io/catalog?offer=market.stats&for=job%2Fknowledge-city-2020-lead-software-architect"},{"id":"job.search","title":"Open jobs by role, technology, place, pay and visa","status":"live","price":{"credits":0.02,"usd":0.002},"unit":"per posting in a list","note":"similar open postings","call":{"mcp_tool":"search_jobs"},"human":"https://alion.io/catalog?offer=job.search&for=job%2Fknowledge-city-2020-lead-software-architect"},{"id":"company.verify","title":"Is this company real and active right now","status":"pilot","price":null,"unit":"per company","request":{"url":"https://alion.io/catalog/request","method":"POST","body":"{\"offer\": \"company.verify\", \"for\": \"job/knowledge-city-2020-lead-software-architect\", \"note\": \"what you need it for\"}"},"human":"https://alion.io/catalog?offer=company.verify&for=job%2Fknowledge-city-2020-lead-software-architect"}],"agent":{"mcp":"https://alion.io/mcp/jobs","mcp_open":"https://alion.io/mcp/open","next":[{"tool":"get_job","arguments":{"id":581380}},{"tool":"search_jobs","arguments":{"company":"knowledgecity.com","detail":"compact"}},{"tool":"match_people","arguments":{"job_id":581380},"note":"people open to offers who fit this vacancy"}],"note":"The same data through MCP tools: https://alion.io/mcp/open needs no sign-in (compact searches, postings, people); https://alion.io/mcp with an Alion account has everything. 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