AI Architect - Finance Technology AI Enablement

ZipStaff is seeking a Senior AI Architect to serve as the top AI/ML technical authority for the finance IT organization at a major healthcare organization.

This is a highly senior, hands-on architecture role. You will translate business transformation vision into a coherent AI/ML technical strategy, design the end-to-end architecture that makes that strategy real, and guide engineering teams through detailed design and implementation. You will be the primary architectural voice for GenAI, machine learning, automation, and agentic systems across finance technology.

What You’ll Do:

• Define the AI/ML technical strategy underpinning finance business transformation.
• Partner with business leaders and senior stakeholders to turn financial and operational goals into AI/ML and automation initiatives.
• Establish an “AI-first” architectural philosophy across finance technology.
• Act as a trusted advisor to executives on AI/ML capability, feasibility, risk, and value.
• Create high-level automation and AI/ML architecture designs and multi-year roadmaps.
• Architect reusable AI/ML foundational frameworks and platforms across finance use cases (fraud detection, forecasting, reconciliation, reporting, analytics, intelligent document/content/audio processing).
• Design high-performing semantic layers using RAG, Knowledge Graphs, and GraphRAG.
• Define reference architectures for agentic AI workflows (multi-agent orchestration, tool use, memory, human-in-the-loop).
• Set architecture and design standards for AI/ML solution delivery.
• Produce detailed designs covering data flows, integration patterns, model serving, event-driven pipelines, and security/governance controls.
• Guide and mentor engineers through design decisions, reviews, and build-out.
• Own architectural quality, scalability, and performance for high-volume financial data processing.
• Drive MLOps/LLMOps practices and represent AI/ML architecture in design-authority forums.

• 12+ years of progressive experience in enterprise architecture, cloud architecture, and distributed systems / platform solutions.
• Proven hands-on experience across Azure, GCP, and AWS.
• Deep experience with Kubernetes and container-based platform architecture.
• Strong background in event-driven architectures and high-volume data processing.
• Demonstrated experience architecting GenAI and Machine Learning solutions in production.
• Experience in financial data processing and analytics (finance, banking, or FinTech IT preferred).
• Track record architecting AI/ML foundational frameworks/platforms used across multiple teams or use cases.
• Technical depth in:
• GenAI: LLM application architecture, RAG, Knowledge Graphs, GraphRAG, semantic search, vector databases.
• Agentic AI: multi-step, multi-agent workflows and orchestration.
• ML: forecasting, fraud/anomaly detection, predictive modeling architectures.
• Automation and AI-enabled analytics / NLP querying against complex relational models.
• Ability to operate at both executive/strategy and detailed engineering levels.
• Strong stakeholder management, mentoring, and standards-setting skills.
• Must be legally authorized to work in the United States without sponsorship now or in the future.

Preferred Qualifications:

• Prior experience in Finance Technology, banking, or regulated financial services.
• Experience with MLOps/LLMOps tooling and model governance / risk frameworks.
• Cloud or architecture certifications (Azure / GCP / AWS Solutions Architect, TOGAF, etc.)., Amazon Web Services (AWS), Architectural Design, Architectural Services, Artificial Intelligence (AI), Automation, Banking Services, Business Transformation, Cloud Architecture, Data Processing, Design Flows, Distributed Computing, Enterprise Architecture, Finance, Financial Analysis, Financial Operations, Financial Services, Financial Strategy, Forecasting, GCP (Good Clinical Practices), Healthcare, Machine Learning, Machine Tool, Memory Hardware, Mentoring, Microsoft Windows Azure, Natural Language Processing (NLP), Philosophy, Predictive Modeling, Query Analysis, Reconciliation, Risk, Risk Modeling, TOGAF - The Open Group Architecture Framework, Technical Strategy, Technical/Engineering Design, Use Cases

ZipStaff partners with leading organizations to connect skilled technology leaders with high-impact contract opportunities. We focus on quality matches and long-term success.