Senior Solution Architect
Posted
Summary
A Senior Solution Architect in Infor's MES (Manufacturing Execution System) Centre of Excellence, supporting both pre-sales (discovery workshops, scoping, cost estimates, RFPs) and delivery (solution design, design reviews, sign-offs, mentoring project teams). Core focus is MES implementations for manufacturing customers, plus ERP integration.
Reporting to a Director within the MES Solution Delivery team, operate as a member of the Centre of Excellence, supporting MES sales teams on later-stage opportunities and MES delivery teams in implementing MES according to best-practice modelling and solutions.
Leverage experience and knowledge to support and mentor solution delivery team members through delivery challenges.
Engage with Sales and Pre-Sales to create accurate cost estimates, including clear assumptions, caveats, and solution-related risks.
Engage with the MES Product team to consult on product development needs and provide requirements arising from both pre-sales and delivery experience.
Pre-Sales
- Engage as resource at the appropriate stage of an opportunity (on-site or remote) to be part of discovery / engage workshops & requirements studies
- Engage effectively during these activities to obtain sufficient knowledge and understanding of customer processes and requirements, to enable effective and accurate solution scoping and estimation
- Work with pre-sales teams to create and present Infor MES capability in the context of sales opportunities
- Consult with pre-sales teams during their activities related to the build-out of tailored software demonstrations
- Provide a point of contact for pre-sales teams completing RFPs to gain input, review etc. on responses
- Raise concerns internally regarding solution fit or areas of risk in a sales opportunity
- Attend customer meetings / calls with account manager and solution consultant
- Create budgetary estimates (ROMs) for sales opportunities with new customers
- Review of cost estimates with appropriate director, prior to raising with client partner
- Assist in the provision of a suitable estimated hardware specification required to support the solution, for Build, Test and Live environments, for a customer
- Author SWOs for sales opportunities with new customers
Solution Delivery
- Review customer requirements collated from pre-sales activity
- Engage as solution architect at the start of a project, working alongside the project team lead to share solution architect responsibilities
- Meet as part of an internal kick-off for each project, in order to gain a shared understanding of the project scope, timeline, requirements, challenges etc. and provide input in relation to the solution delivery elements
- Engage during design phase of each project (for both new customers, following the prototype methodology, and package activities for existing customers) to define the appropriate design for the solution
- Work alongside the project team to design scalable, customer-focused solutions that align with client requirements and minimize delivery timelines
- Aim to reduce project costs and complexity by adhering to the Infor T2V strategy with minimal customizations, ensuring long-term maintainability
- Provide appropriate coaching, guidance and support for project teams to implement the appropriate solution for their customer
- Provide appropriate input for project teams to write test plans for the solution
- Review and sign-off prototype solutions prior to presenting to the customer during the project delivery
- Review and sign-off test execution results prior to handing over the final built solution to the customer
- Consult on change requests raised during projects - for suitability, practicality, estimated effort, estimated delivery time, risk in inclusion into scope etc.
- Engage where possible with escalations related to the solution (vs. the project delivery) - involve a director of solution delivery if needed
- Conduct effective Design Reviews for each active project the SA is operating within, document corrective actions to be taken, subsequent follow-up to ensure adherence to standards
- Support auditing of the test, release and deployment processes for a project/solution - provide sign-off ahead of deployment, ensure adherence to process
- Engage with support resources where required to provide explanation and assistance about project solutions
- Engage with support team to facilitate solution handover at project completion - enabling timely handover of the solution, freeing up project delivery team earlier from the overhead of support.
Solution Delivery Processes & Tools
- Act as a member of the MES solution delivery centre of excellence, within the MES business unit
- Provide input into processes related to solution delivery, in discussion with the solution delivery director - e.g. design reviews, testing process, release & deployment process
- Guide adoption of new processes by project teams, through on-the-job direction and enablement
- Develop and maintain MES IPC content
- Engage in the PKS "Project Knowledge Share" process - supporting discussion on solving customer requirements
- Attend regular Solution Delivery CoE team meetings - raise issues, provide input during discussions
Customers
- Build trust and foster long-term client partnerships by consistently delivering innovative designs that meet and even exceed expectations
- Engage in effective and honest discussion with customers regarding solution requirements that bring risk, need revision, are unachievable etc.
Product
- Provide input for definition of new requirements in support of the OTB strategy, integration etc. - driven by in-field use cases and customer engagement
- Contribute to discussions about how the product works, was intended to work, should work in future
- Engage in regular review meetings with the heads of MES product and development, where a valid change request is identified and needs to be raised for discussion and sponsorship
- Assist with specification of product change requests
- Review and sign-off on product change request specifications
- Engage in the authoring and review of content for system documentation
Internal Enablement
- Act as first level of support for services teams and solution consultants where solution-related questions arise
- Support the provision of guidance and enablement to partner solution architect resources, driving best-practice solution implementation during partner-led projects
- Gain awareness and understanding of all new features through release training and additional enablement where needed
- Build knowledge of manufacturing processes through engagement with customers and project delivery teams
- Work with the enablement team to identify new opportunities for enablement content and activities
- Work with wider Info teams (primarily ERP) to explain the requirements of MES, the expectations regarding integration, and the ability for MES to address hard-to-reach ERP requirements
Personnel Development & Support
- Mentor Senior Consultants that may engage in some of the pre-sales or solution delivery activity to prepare them for engagements such as discovery workshops, design workshops, etc. - with a view to develop them into a member of the solution delivery CoE in future.
- Ad-hoc, on-the-job guidance and enablement for all members of project delivery teams, to develop their solution architect and delivery skills and aid future MES implementations.
- Educated to degree level in computing, business information systems, manufacturing engineering, manufacturing technology or a related subject
- Ability to freely travel abroad
- Fluent in English
- Flexibility in working hours as needed
- Experience with the implementation of MES solutions
- Experience of working directly in manufacturing industries (preferably in operations, or IT) or indirectly (customers in manufacturing sector), demonstrating a level of manufacturing operations knowledge and key concepts
- Experience working within a software delivery or development team, with a focus on solution architecture
- Experience with ERP solutions or with other Level 3 solutions such as WMS, LIMS, CMMS etc. - either in their usage or delivery
- Additional spoken languages
