Director of Software Architecture & Infrastructure

Summary

As the Director of Software Architecture and Infrastructure at IOG, you lead the guild of architects. This guild regroups all Architecture Directors for IOG projects and programs, who report to you. 

IOHK is a research and development, innovation driven company. Your mission is to provide a long term architectural vision at IOG that ensures collaboration, knowledge-sharing, interoperability and reusability of specifications and implementations across IOG’s projects (Cardano, Atala and others).  You also have the responsibility for defining which support infrastructure (Cloud, On-Premise and others) these projects will need to support, to implement and to recommend. In order to assist you in this mission, you will have the support of the Head of Interoperability and infrastructure experts.

You will lead a team of accomplished architects and engineers and be able to manage the uncertainties and ambiguities associated with working in a remote-first, distributed, decentralized environment. 

You will report to the CTO and work closely with the Chief Scientist, Chief Product Officer and the Research division in order to define the architectural vision and strategy for the company. You will be responsible  for hiring the Architecture Directors when the company funds new projects and initiatives.

Duties

The duties of the role include, but are not limited to:

• Lead the chapter of Architects and manage Directors of architecture
• Hire the Director of architecture when IOG bootstraps new initiatives
• Recruit and build an outstanding team of infrastructure Architects 
• Recruit and build an outstanding team specifically dedicated to blockchain interoperability
• Define a vision and instill a culture of fostering ingenuity, creativity, inventiveness, originality, problem solving and simplicity in the team
• Define processes for the team to:
  • Ensure knowledge sharing between projects and teams
  • Ensure that architectural work can be reused across projects as much as possible
  • Define and implement best practices for architecture specifications
  • Define recommendations for support infrastructure for our projects
  • Coordinate with all other departments, in particular Product, IT and Research, and address their requirements
  • Integrate technical trends reports and prototypes developed internally 
• Align with the department of Formal Methods to ensure that best practices are followed for implementing formally verified architecture when beneficial 
• Coordinate with the Applied Cryptography department to ensure that architecture are cryptographically secure and reuse state of the art technologies
• Work closely with the Director of Engineering to make sure that architecture is implemented following software development best practices, coding and quality guidelines
• Work closely with the Research Division to forecast the technologies to be integrated in future architecture
• Work closely with the Product Division in order to manage a backlog of features to be supported by the architecture 
• Work closely with the IT department to define IOG requirements for operating its support infrastructure 
• Drive performance management conversations, and develop shared, organization level goals, across IOG, driving results in common goals to keep team performance on-track and aligned with our high-quality standards

Leadership

As Leaders, it is our responsibility to motivate, develop and progress our team members. As a Leader, there is a need to communicate openly with all members of your team, address any issues head on and confront difficult conversations when required.

Empowering your team to provide the best results by organizing clear processes, and coordinating team efforts, should be your top priority.

Please read our Leadership at IO Global document for more information on your duties and responsibilities as a leader at IOG

Requirements

Key Competencies 

• Impeccable leadership
• Exceptional communicator
• Open minded and horizontal team management 
• Ability to define, negotiate and execute on a roadmap
• Ability to design highly effective processes and animate a team of experts
• Ability to read, understand and contribute to academic/research publications
• Ability to design and comprehend state of the art blockchain architecture
• Ability to comprehend and integrate bleeding edge cryptographic primitives and formal methods
• Vast knowledge and expertise in distributed systems engineering and blockchain systems architecture

Education / Experience

• PhD or Master in Computer Science 
• 15+ years of experience in computing
• 5+ years in the crypto/blockchain industry
• 5+ years as a team leader or manager
• Professional English

Benefits

• Flexible schedule
• Remote work
• Laptop reimbursement
• New starter package to buy hardware essentials (headphones, monitor, etc)
• Learning & Development opportunities
• Competitive PTO 
• Medical Benefits

At IOG, we value diversity and always treat all employees and job applicants based on merit, qualifications, competence, and talent. We do not discriminate on the basis of race, religion, color, national origin, gender, sexual orientation, age, marital status, veteran status, or disability status.