Software Architect

A Software Architect is accountable for creating the conditions in which strong architectural decisions emerge across teams. Rather than acting as a central authority or approval gate, the architect operates as a facilitator - shaping direction, enabling teams, and ensuring that local decisions align with broader system goals, organisational strategy, and long-term sustainability. This role exists to optimise the system as a whole - not individual components - balancing autonomy with coherence across a complex, evolving technology landscape.

WHY JOIN THE TEAM

This is a high-impact role at the heart of how we evolve our technology and product operating model. You'll work with senior stakeholders and engineering teams to simplify complexity, modernise our platforms, and deliver meaningful outcomes for the business. It's an opportunity to move beyond traditional "solution ownership" into true product leadership, shaping both what we build and how we build it., * Facilitate architectural thinking within teams rather than owning decisions centrally

• Support engineers and tech leads in evaluating trade-offs (e.g. scalability, operability, cost, coupling, resilience)
• Encourage explicit decision-making through lightweight artefacts (e.g. ADRs, design narratives)
• Ensure decisions are made at the right level - pushing ownership to teams wherever possible
• Set clear architectural direction through principles, patterns, and "sensible defaults"
• Establish and evolve paved roads and golden paths that make good decisions the easiest decisions
• Avoid heavyweight governance (e.g. design authorities, approval boards) in favour of guidance and enablement
• Work closely with Product, Engineering, and Delivery leadership to ensure alignment between: Business goals, Product strategy, and Technology direction
• Help shape decisions around build vs buy, platform vs product, and long-term investment
• Coach and mentor engineers and tech leads in architectural thinking

• Strong experience designing and evolving distributed systems
• Deep understanding of architectural trade-offs (e.g. coupling, cohesion, consistency, scalability)
• Familiarity with evolutionary architecture practices (e.g. fitness functions, incremental change)
• Experience with modern engineering practices (CI/CD, observability, cloud-native systems)
• Proven ability to influence without authority across multiple teams
• Strong facilitation skills - able to guide discussions and surface trade-offs
• Comfortable operating in ambiguity and complexity
• Able to challenge constructively and build alignment across diverse stakeholders

DESIRED BUT NOT REQUIRED:

• Experience working in large-scale digital or media organisations
• Familiarity with modern product operating models and outcome-driven delivery approaches
• Exposure to financial planning, vendor management or commercial technology decisions

A globally renowned media company borne of the BBC. We make and distribute the world's most sought-after TV, audio and digital content. Our ambition is to be the home of the most powerful, entertaining, and inspiring stories for people all around the world.