Director, Cloud Technology

This position follows our hybrid workstyle policy: expected to be in a Raymond James office location a minimum of 10-12 days a month. This role is not eligible for work visa sponsorship, either currently or in the future.

About the Role

The Director of MERLIN is responsible for the strategic leadership, engineering, and operational excellence of MERLIN, the Raymond James Oversight (RJ Oversight) cloud data lake. MERLIN serves as the centralized foundation for regulatory oversight, supervision, compliance, operational reporting, analytics, and AI-enabled insights, enabling trusted, governed, and scalable access to data across RJ Oversight.

This leader will define and execute the technology vision, architecture, and roadmap for the MERLIN platform, ensuring the delivery of secure, scalable, resilient, and high-performing data and analytics capabilities that support critical business functions across RJ Oversight. The Director will lead multiple engineering teams responsible for platform engineering, data engineering, cloud modernization, business intelligence, and operational support while partnering closely with business leaders, Enterprise Architecture, Infrastructure, Information Security, Risk, Compliance, Operations, and other technology organizations.

The Director will foster a culture of engineering excellence, continuous improvement, and innovation while ensuring operational stability, regulatory compliance, and exceptional service delivery. As the technology owner for MERLIN, this leader will drive the evolution of the platform as the strategic cloud data lake for RJ Oversight, enabling modern analytics, automation, and AI capabilities that accelerate business value while maintaining the highest standards of governance, security, and operational excellence.

Responsibilities

• Define and execute the technology vision, architecture, and roadmap for the MERLIN platform.
• Lead multiple engineering teams responsible for platform engineering, data engineering, cloud modernization, business intelligence, and operational support.
• Partner closely with business leaders, Enterprise Architecture, Infrastructure, Information Security, Risk, Compliance, Operations, and other technology organizations.
• Foster a culture of engineering excellence, continuous improvement, and innovation.
• Ensure operational stability, regulatory compliance, and exceptional service delivery.
• Drive the evolution of MERLIN as the strategic cloud data lake for RJ Oversight, enabling modern analytics, automation, and AI capabilities.
• Build and develop high-performing engineering teams through coaching, mentoring, and talent development.
• Create an environment of accountability, innovation, and continuous improvement.
• Lead organizational change while maintaining team engagement and execution excellence.
• Align technology investments with business strategy and enterprise architecture.
• Develop long-term platform roadmaps that improve scalability, resiliency, and operational efficiency.
• Anticipate future technology trends and identify opportunities to modernize capabilities.
• Deliver complex, multi-team technology initiatives on schedule and within budget.
• Balance strategic initiatives with operational support responsibilities.
• Prioritize work effectively across competing business and regulatory demands.
• Communicate effectively with executives, business leaders, architects, engineers, and external partners.
• Translate complex technical concepts into business-focused outcomes.
• Build consensus across organizations with differing priorities.
• Develop trusted relationships with Compliance, Risk, Operations, Supervision, Internal Audit, and other enterprise stakeholders.
• Understand business processes and translate business needs into scalable technical solutions.
• Promote enterprise standards and eliminate duplicative capabilities through shared platforms.
• Ensure platform stability, availability, security, and service quality.
• Champion operational excellence through monitoring, automation, and continuous improvement.
• Lead incident management, production support, and governance processes.
• Drive adoption of emerging technologies, AI-enabled analytics, automation, and modern engineering practices.
• Encourage experimentation while maintaining appropriate governance and risk controls.
• Continuously improve developer productivity and platform capabilities.

Requirements

• 10+ years of progressive experience in data engineering, analytics engineering, business intelligence, or enterprise data platforms.
• 5+ years of technology leadership experience managing engineering teams responsible for enterprise data and analytics solutions.
• Deep understanding of modern data architecture, data warehousing, ETL/ELT, data integration, metadata management, and data governance principles.
• Experience designing and delivering cloud-based data platforms utilizing technologies such as Snowflake, AWS/Azure, Databricks, or similar enterprise cloud ecosystems.
• Strong knowledge of SQL and enterprise data modeling with experience supporting large-scale analytical workloads.
• Experience with business intelligence and visualization platforms such as Qlik Sense, Power BI, Tableau, or similar technologies.
• Knowledge of DevOps, CI/CD pipelines, Infrastructure as Code (Terraform/OpenTofu), version control, and software engineering best practices.
• Experience leading modernization initiatives involving cloud migration, automation, and platform standardization.
• Understanding of data security, privacy, regulatory compliance, and risk management within financial services.
• Experience managing vendor relationships, technology roadmaps, and cross-functional delivery across multiple business stakeholders.
• Bachelor’s degree in Data Science, Information Technology, or related field (required).
• More than 15 years of general work experience, with 10 to 15 years of managerial experience.
• Travel less than 25%.

Benefits

This position is eligible for a benefits package that may include:

• Medical, dental, and vision insurance.
• Life insurance, critical illness insurance, and accident insurance.
• Disability benefits.
• Retirement savings.
• Paid time off (including vacation, holidays, and sick leave).
• Parental leave.

Eligibility for benefits and specific offerings may vary based on position and employment status. For more details, visit Myrjbenefits.com.

Pay

The total compensation for this position includes base salary or wages and may include additional components such as cash or equity-based incentives, discretionary bonuses, or commissions.