Unilever - Salesforce Platform Architect - Consumer Operations Platform

Main Purpose of the Job :

- Unilever is one of the world's leading suppliers of Food, Home and Personal Care products with sales exceeding - 50 billion per annum. We touch the lives of more than 2 billion consumers a day in over 190 countries, through our portfolio of more than 400 iconic brands (including Persil, Dove, Knorr, Domestos, Hellmann- s, Lipton, Wall- s, PG Tips, Ben & Jerry- s, Marmite, Magnum and Lynx).

- The Consumer Operations Platform Team (part of the Consumer IT Team) manages the key relationships in Global Marketing including Marketing Operations, Marketing Excellence, Brand Comms and Marketing Innovation.

- The Consumer Operations Platform is the technology platform underpinning Global Marketing's business processes, mainly (but not exclusively) based on Salesforce.com. The team is responsible for all aspects of the IT business application design, is accountable for design quality from feasibility to delivery and timely delivery of affordable and sustainable IT business solutions at acceptable risk to ongoing operations, in line with the long-term plans for the evolution of our key IT landscapes. The team also owns the end-user experience, service delivery and operation of applications on the platform.

- As the Senior Consumer Operations Platform Architect, you will work with product teams to develop customer-centric digital software products from idea to production. You will be responsible for articulating and driving a global architectural vision and strategy for the Consumer Operations Platform, as well as developing and validating the architecture and solution design aligned to critical business capabilities. You will guide and mentor development teams on methodologies, processes and best practices on implementing technology solutions in Unilever. You will provide technical expertise with cloud-enabled applications, digital platforms and API management to develop customer-centric products from idea to production within small, empowered, agile teams.

Main Accountabilities :

- The Senior Consumer Operations Platform Architect will be expected to work on multiple tasks and initiatives concurrently while being accountable for driving success through enforcing software engineering methodology and standards, reviewing design packages and driving to minimise technical exposure and risks on projects.

- The Platform Architect and his/her team are responsible for ensuring quality of any code going into production. They will act as the final gate to check quality of code, adherence to coding standards, adequate testing and performance testing before allowing for release of new code into production.

- The Platform Architect will be engaged throughout solution delivery and actively take part in and support agile methodologies for delivery, identifying technology synergies across the entire product portfolio to support a relentless drive towards a lean operation. This role will be responsible for defining and maintaining the technical standards for the platform in the areas of technology, testing, development and security. As a technical thought leader, the Platform Architect will maintain an awareness of new and emerging technologies and their potential application to existing service offerings.

- The Platform Architecture team will be responsible for providing guidance, reviewing platform architecture and solution design of every functionality being worked upon by the product teams on the platform. This will ensure it is in line with the design and security standards defined by the relevant Core Technology, Enterprise Architecture and Information Security teams

Experience Required :

- Extensive architecture experience in applications development in a complex, multi-platform distributed environment

- Exposure to layered solutions and designs, diverse technical configurations, multiple technologies and processing environments

- Familiar with service-oriented architecture principles and frameworks (TOGAF, Zachman, Gartner, DOD, etc.)

- Experience of working on projects delivered using Waterfall & Agile methodologies across the full application lifecycle

- Excellent customer-facing skills and presence

- Demonstrable knowledge of industry trends and standards

- Exceptional communication (English language) and interpersonal skills - including negotiation, facilitation, and consensus building skills; ability to influence and persuade, without direct control

- Degree-level educated or equivalent experience

- Familiarity with software usability [UX/UI] concepts

- Software prototyping experience

- Salesforce certification

- Salesforce.com experience, ideally in an FMCG or similar industry environment

- Experience in designing, developing, and deploying cloud-based solutions which leverage cloud provided platforms

- Experience in designing and developing applications using Java, .NET, mobile and web services.

- Experience in application refactoring and modernization

- Strong leadership, coaching and mentoring skills.

- High degree of flexibility and ability to work with employees at all levels of the organization with diverse backgrounds.

- Inherently curious with a strong desire to drive change, and ability to adapt to change quickly.