Platform Architect, Personalized Indexing Technology

Key Responsibilities

• Lead the definition and evolution of application and platform architecture aligned with VPI business strategy, product roadmaps, and Vanguard technology standards.
• Drive key architectural decisions for cloud-native systems, balancing scalability, resiliency, security, and cost.
• Develop and review architecture and design documentation for new capabilities and platform enhancements.
• Partner closely with product owners, engineering teams, and business stakeholders to ensure solutions meet functional and non-functional requirements.
• Act as a hands-on individual contributor, designing and building solutions across the VPI platform.
• Develop cloud-native services on AWS, including microservices, APIs, and supporting infrastructure.
• Write production-quality code primarily in Java and Python, with a strong focus on maintainability and performance.
• Contribute to data engineering and platform integration efforts supporting investment workflows, analytics, and operational processes.
• Help modernize and evolve existing systems while maintaining stability of critical production workloads.
• Design and implement scalable infrastructure using AWS, including containerized workloads and Kubernetes.
• Build and operate microservices architectures leveraging messaging, caching, and asynchronous processing patterns.
• Partner with teams on infrastructure automation, CI/CD pipelines, observability, and operational excellence.
• Identify and resolve moderately complex production and platform issues, assessing risks and driving pragmatic solutions.

Hands-On Engineering & Delivery

• Act as a hands-on individual contributor, designing and building solutions across the VPI platform.
• Develop cloud-native services on AWS, including microservices, APIs, and supporting infrastructure.
• Write production-quality code primarily in Java and Python, with a strong focus on maintainability and performance.
• Contribute to data engineering and platform integration efforts supporting investment workflows, analytics, and operational processes.
• Help modernize and evolve existing systems while maintaining stability of critical production workloads.
• Design and implement scalable infrastructure using AWS, including containerized workloads and Kubernetes.
• Build and operate microservices architectures leveraging messaging, caching, and asynchronous processing patterns.
• Partner with teams on infrastructure automation, CI/CD pipelines, observability, and operational excellence.
• Identify and resolve moderately complex production and platform issues, assessing risks and driving pragmatic solutions.

Collaboration & Vendor Evaluation

• Consult with other technology and product teams across Vanguard to ensure alignment and reuse where appropriate.
• Lead and participate in build vs. buy evaluations, including assessment of vendors, tools, and platforms.
• Provide technical guidance during vendor onboarding, integrations, and proof-of-concept efforts.

Additional Responsibilities

• Participate in special initiatives supporting the growth and scalability of the VPI business.
• Contribute to continuous improvement of engineering practices, standards, and platform reliability.

Required Qualifications

• Strong engineering background with experience building investment platforms, financial systems, or large-scale distributed systems.
• 8 years experience with Computer science or related degree.
• Demonstrated experience as a hands-on architect or senior engineer delivering production systems.
• Proficiency in Java and Python.
• Experience designing and building cloud-native architectures on AWS.
• Solid understanding of microservices architectures, including messaging, caching, and asynchronous processing.
• Experience with Kubernetes and container-based platforms.
• Working knowledge of data engineering concepts and data-intensive systems.
• Ability to operate effectively as an independent contributor while collaborating across teams.

Preferred Qualifications

• Experience with direct indexing, portfolio management, tax-loss harvesting, or investment operations platforms.
• Familiarity with high-volume, high-availability financial systems.
• Experience modernizing legacy platforms into cloud-native architectures.
• Strong understanding of operational concerns such as resiliency, monitoring, security, and cost optimization.