Salesforce Architect

About the role

OU Education Services (OUES) is seeking a Salesforce Architect to serve as the internal technical owner for Salesforce architecture, solution design, and integrations involving the platform. This role is responsible for ensuring Salesforce solutions are scalable, secure, supportable, and aligned with OUES's broader technology environment.

Responsibilities

• Own Salesforce Architecture and Solution Design

• Translate business capabilities and product requirements into scalable, secure, and supportable Salesforce solutions

• Define and maintain standards for data models, automation, security, customization, and development

• Determine when to use native Salesforce functionality, configuration, custom development, integration, or another platform

• Evaluate architectural options, constraints, risks, and tradeoffs before implementation

• Identify decisions that must be structurally correct early and capabilities that can be safely deferred

• Lead Salesforce Integration Design

• Technical design for integrations into and out of Salesforce

• Define appropriate integration approaches using APIs, middleware, batch processing, event-driven patterns, and vendor-managed interfaces

• Partner with enterprise data and integration teams to establish system-of-record, data ownership, synchronization, and dependency approaches

• Ensure Salesforce integrations include appropriate monitoring, error handling, reconciliation, and recovery

• Protect Platform Quality and Maintainability

• Review solution designs, configurations, automations, custom development, and integration approaches

• Challenge requirements or recommendations that introduce unnecessary complexity, customization, or technical debt

• Establish technical standards for Salesforce environments, releases, deployments, and change management

• Maintain visibility into architectural decisions, platform risks, and technical debt

• Ensure Salesforce solutions remain understandable, supportable, and owned by OUES

• Contribute to architecture documentation, solution designs, integration inventories, decision logs, and implementation runbooks

• Guide Vendors and Delivery Teams

• Provide technical direction to Salesforce administrators, developers, vendors, and implementation partners

• Review vendor proposals, technical recommendations, and implementation deliverables

• Ensure external partners build against OUES architecture, standards, and long-term ownership needs

• Serve as the technical point of escalation for Salesforce architecture, platform design, and integrations involving Salesforce

• Support release readiness by validating technical dependencies, assumptions, environment needs, migration considerations, and implementation risks

• Partner Across the Enterprise

• Partner with Product Ownership to ensure technical solutions support business outcomes, roadmap priorities, and phased delivery

• Partner with Operations, Enrollment, and Marketing teams to understand workflows, business needs, and platform requirements and simplify Salesforce design where possible

• Partner with Data and IT teams on Salesforce integration with Microsoft Fabric, analytics, reporting, governance, and future AI capabilities

• Partner with PMO and delivery teams to identify technical dependencies, sequencing risks, and decisions requiring escalation

Qualifications

• Significant experience designing and delivering enterprise Salesforce solutions

• Strong knowledge of Salesforce architecture, including data modeling, automation, security, sharing, integrations, and development patterns

• Experience translating complex business requirements into structured technical solutions

• Experience designing Salesforce integrations using APIs, middleware, batch processing, or event-driven approaches

• Strong understanding of configuration, automation, custom development, and integration tradeoffs

• Experience with Salesforce environments, releases, deployment practices, and change management

• Ability to assess technical feasibility, scalability, supportability, and architectural risk

• Strong communication skills with the ability to explain technical decisions and tradeoffs to technical and non-technical stakeholders

• Demonstrated ability to challenge assumptions and recommend simpler, more sustainable approaches