Lead Technical Architect

About us:

We are the Information Intelligence Group (IIG) of CACI UK, a specialist technical consultancy providing bespoke solutions to solve complex operational problems. Due to some exciting growth within our Central Government business, we are interested in speaking with an experienced Technical Architect.

Role Location:

You can work from any of our 6 offices in the UK (including Bristol, Cheltenham & London) or from home, you decide. The role will however require you make regular visits to the team based in London.

About the Role: 

We are looking for an experienced and highly skilled Lead Technical Architect with expertise in cloud-based architectures to join our team. You will play a pivotal role in designing, implementing, and overseeing advanced cloud infrastructure solutions for mission-critical systems. In this role, you will use your deep knowledge of security architecture on cloud platforms to provide technical leadership and strategic direction in building scalable, secure, and resilient cloud-native systems based on AWS, Kubernetes, Kafka, microservices, Java, and event-driven design.

Key Responsibilities: 

• Cloud Architecture Design: Lead the design of cloud-based systems and solutions, utilising AWS and modern architectural patterns such as microservices, event-driven architectures, and serverless computing to meet both current and future business needs. 

• Cloud Security: Develop and implement robust security architectures for cloud solutions, ensuring data protection, regulatory compliance, and alignment with industry best practices (e.g., AWS IAM, encryption, VPC, security monitoring, and auditing). 

• Containerisation & Orchestration: Architect and oversee containerised environments using Kubernetes, ensuring high availability, scalability, and fault tolerance for critical applications.

• Event-Driven Systems: Lead a team to architect event-driven systems using Kafka, designing and managing messaging frameworks to handle real-time data processing across distributed microservices.

• Microservices Architecture: Design and oversee the development of microservices-based systems, establishing best practices for modularity, scalability, and maintainability, with a focus on Java-based backend services. 

• Technical Leadership: Provide technical leadership and mentorship to architecture and development teams, guiding them through complex technical challenges and architectural decisions.

• Security & Compliance: Ensure that cloud architectures are compliant with industry regulations (e.g., GDPR, HIPAA) and company security policies, and implement security controls across the infrastructure. 

• CI/CD & Automation: Champion the development of CI/CD pipelines, infrastructure as code (IaC), and automation to enable fast and reliable delivery of cloud services.

• Work closely with DevOps, engineering teams, product management, and stakeholders to ensure that architectural strategies align with both technical and business objectives.

• Performance & Cost Optimisation: Drive performance tuning, cost optimisation, and cloud resource management strategies to maximise efficiency and minimise cloud spend.

• Risk Management: Identify and mitigate technical risks in cloud-based systems and infrastructure.

• Documentation & Best Practices: Develop and maintain architectural standards, design patterns, and documentation, ensuring a shared understanding of technical solutions. Capturing/documenting architectural decisions. 

The Fit:

We are looking for someone with previous experience in designing and implementing large-scale, distributed cloud systems, with a strong focus on AWS. Additional skills required include:

• Extensive experience with cloud security architecture, including knowledge of AWS security best practices (e.g., IAM, network security, encryption).

• Deep expertise in containerisation technologies (Docker) and Kubernetes for orchestration in production environments. 

• Proven experience in designing and implementing event-driven architectures, with strong expertise in queue-based systems including Kafka. 

• Strong background in microservices architecture and hands-on experience with Java-based backend systems.

• In-depth understanding of CI/CD pipelines, infrastructure as code (e.g., Terraform, CloudFormation), and automated deployment processes. 

• Excellent communication and leadership skills, with the ability to collaborate effectively with cross-functional teams and provide technical mentorship.

• Experience with monitoring and logging tools (e.g., Prometheus, Grafana, ELK Stack) and cloud cost optimisation strategies. 

• Familiarity with serverless architectures and AWS Lambda. 

• AWS certification(s) (e.g., AWS Certified Solutions Architect, AWS Certified Security – Specialty) preferred.

• Understanding of architectural standards and frameworks e.g. TOGAF

Due to the industries we work in, we require the successful candidate to be able to obtain high level security clearance. To qualify for this, you must be a British citizen and have lived permanently in the UK for the last 5 years.

Why work for us?

IIG has the culture and feel of a small business, paired with the benefits of our position in a much larger organisation. The Technical Architect role is an excellent opportunity, and CACI reward their staff well with a competitive salary and impressive benefits package which includes:

• Flexi-time: 37.5 hour weeks to structure how you want.
• Hybrid working: Work from one of our offices or from home - you choose
• L&D: Budget for conferences, training courses and other materials.
• Social: Fantastic culture with monthly social events.
• Future You: Matched pension and health care package.

We offer a great L&D package including 5 days external training, a career coach and guilds to share innovation and learning. We also offer self-directed career progression, that fosters opportunities for success for us and our business.

We take great pride in taking care of our talent, providing a highly dynamic, inclusive and team-led environment where everyone can thrive.

Equal Opportunities:

CACI is proud to be an equal opportunities employer. Embracing the diversity of our people, we are on a journey to build a truly inclusive work environment where no one is treated less favourably due to ethnic origin, age, gender, veteran status, religion or belief, sexual orientation, marital status, and disability or health condition, actively working to pre vent discrimination.

As a Disability Confident employer, we will;

• Provide reasonable adjustments in the recruitment process where requested (contact a member of the recruitment team on 020 7602 6000 to discuss individual requirements further).
• Offer people with health conditions and disabilities, meeting the minimum criteria for a role, an interview.

Our people are unique and we encourage, and support them, to be confident in contributing to our inclusion journey.