Senior Solution Architect

Role: Senior Solution Architect

Location: Milton Keynes / London (Hybrid)                      

Reporting to: Head of Architecture

We are looking for a Senior Solution Architect, to help define and drive forward the technology strategy behind Rightmove’s internal business processes, from sales automation and order fulfilment to pricing, billing management, and customer support.

You will be experienced in breaking down enterprise processes into component parts and defining solutions that integrate with existing systems, allowing both process and technology to evolve to meet future needs. You should have worked as an architect on highly distributed platforms consisting of both bespoke built applications and industry standard software. More importantly you thrive from bringing a hands-on approach to the role, eager to work alongside product team engineers implementing solutions, and working directly with technology providers.

The Architect team works closely with Product & Platform Reliability and Engineering teams to ensure our application delivery platform supports the scale, security and resilience required while being agile enough to allow continuous releases of new functionality. Joining Rightmove at this time you can expect to be part of some key projects:

·       Support the evolution of our customer-self-service platform integrating with existing up and downstream processes.

·       Modernising our legacy estate, involving driving evaluation and adoption of best-of-breed SaaS solutions and integrating them into our existing estate.

·       Migrating our container-based application platform from a multi data centre model to cloud (GCP), redefining core architectural patterns and platforms.

If you believe you have what it takes to help us meet these architectural challenges and want to apply your knowledge working for one of the most popular websites in the UK, we’d love to hear from you.

Senior Solution Architect responsibilities include

·       Contribute to the technology strategy, with a focus on business process evolution, agreeing key milestones and ensuring any plan provides room for early experimentation of new approaches.

·       Work with Product Managers to understand their roadmaps and share design ideas.

·       Collaborate with business stakeholders, end-users, and product teams to understand current issues, coordinating the analysis of associated business processes, and building architectural decisions based on data gathered.

·       Understand the enterprise software marketplace, defining build vs buy options and evaluating potential suppliers - covering functional and non-functional scope, technical integration, and commercial criteria.

·       Engage with our existing technology partners to understand their products and identify opportunities where we can use them to advance our own technical capabilities and optimise costs.

·       Encourage teams to work independently while providing enough guidance to ensure good technical decisions are made and architectural consistency is maintained.

·       Provide mentoring support to the engineering community, using your experience and knowledge to help shape best practice, tackle our hardest problems, and promote new ideas.

·       Investigate, prototype, and promote latest emergent technologies and architectural patterns.

We’re looking for someone who

·       Translates business goals into technology solutions, identifying opportunities and anticipating future need.

·       Understands key enterprise integration patterns and when to use them.

·       Looks to drive architectural level improvements, while also keen to be involved in hands-on implementation.

·       Has commercial experience designing business process solutions, across highly distributed architectures.

·       Can share architectural ideas confidently and clearly to a wide range of stakeholders.

·       Encourages contributions from everyone and actively seeks to be inclusive in design decisions.

Ideally, we are looking for the following background:

·       Excellent knowledge of the enterprise software landscape.

·       Experience working with CRM, BPM, payments, and/or ticketing systems.

You will have the opportunity to work across a variety of technologies including GCP, Kubernetes (GKE), Kafka, Elasticsearch, Oracle, Couchbase and Apigee, so previous experience in any of these is welcome.

About us

Our vision is to give everyone the belief they can make their move. We aim to make moving simpler, by giving everyone the best place to turn to and return to for access to the tools, expertise, trust and belief to make it happen.

We're home to the UK's largest choice of properties, and are the go-to destination for millions of people planning their next move, reading the latest industry news, or just browsing what's on the market.

Despite this growth, we’ve remained a friendly, supportive place to work, with employee #1 still working here!  We’ve done this by placing the Rightmove Hows at the heart of everything we do. These are the essential values that reflect our culture, and include:

• We create value…by delivering results and building trust with partners and consumers. 

• We think bigger…by acting with curiosity and setting bold aspirations. 

• We care deeply…by being real, having fun, and valuing diversity. 

• We move together…by being one team - internally collaborative, externally competitive. 

• We make a difference…by focusing on delivering measurable impact. 

We believe in careers that open doors, and help our team develop by providing an open and inclusive work environment, offering ongoing training opportunities, and supporting charity fundraising events. And with 88% of Rightmovers saying we’re a great place to work, we’re clearly doing something right!

If all this has caught your eye, you may well be a Rightmover in the making...  

What we offer

People are the foundation of Rightmove - We’ll help you build a career on it.

• Cash plan for dental, optical and physio treatments
• Private Medical Insurance, Pension and Life Insurance, Employee Assistance Plan
• 27 days holiday plus two (paid) volunteering days a year to give back, and holiday buy schemes
• Hybrid working pattern with 2 days in office 
• Contributory stakeholder pension
• Life assurance at 4x your basic salary to a spouse, family member or other nominated person in your life
• Competitive compensation package 
• Paid leave for maternity, paternity, adoption & fertility
• Travel Loans, Bike to Work scheme, Rental Deposit Loan 
• Charitable contributions through Payroll Giving and donation matching 
• Access deals and discounts on things like travel, electronics, fashion, gym memberships, cinema discounts and more

As an Equal Opportunity Employer, Rightmove will never discriminate on the basis of age, disability, sex, race, religion or belief, gender reassignment, marriage/civil partnership, pregnancy/maternity, or sexual orientation.

At Rightmove, we believe that a diverse and inclusive workforce leads to better innovation, productivity, and overall success. We are committed to creating a welcoming and inclusive environment for all employees, regardless of their background or identity, to develop and promote a diverse culture that reflects the communities we serve.

Ultimately, we care much more about the person you are, and how you think and approach things, than a list of qualifications and buzzwords on a CV. Even if you can’t say ‘yes’ to all the above, but are smart, self-motivated and passionate about Customer Care, then get in touch.