Chief Enterprise Architect

Every day, Global Payments makes it possible for millions of people to move money between buyers and sellers using our payments solutions for credit, debit, prepaid and merchant services. Our worldwide team helps over 3 million companies, more than 1,300 financial institutions and over 600 million cardholders grow with confidence and achieve amazing results. We are driven by our passion for success and we are proud to deliver best-in-class payment technology and software solutions. Join our dynamic team and make your mark on the payments technology landscape of tomorrow.

Job Description:

The Chief Enterprise Architect (CEA) owns the Enterprise Architecture, standards and strategy for the organization. Develops, maintains and facilitates the use of technology to enable the company to achieve its business goals by linking technology and services to business strategy and objectives. CEA is accountable for defining and realizing Global Payments' enterprise-wide target state architecture to achieve targeted business outcomes that support enterprise priorities for growing revenue, optimizing costs and mitigating risks. Drives architectural decisions for the company, while balancing value creation and speed-to-market with the rigor of governance, simplification, and sustainability. Leads the enterprise architecture team, works with the business unit CIOs, CTO, CISO as well as business and functional leaders. This role shapes how innovation becomes scalable, how platforms become interoperable, and how technology becomes a business multiplier. You'll define how architecture accelerates innovation, simplifies complexity, and turns technology into a durable source of advantage. At Global Payments, architecture is about impact, scalability, and resilience for the future of commerce.

Key Responsibilities

1. Architecture Strategy & Target State Design

* Design and own the enterprise-wide target state architecture and multi-year architecture roadmap aligned with Global Payments' technology and data strategy.

* Make informed, forward-looking decisions on the evolution of enterprise architecture, including adoption of emerging technologies in alignment with business priorities.

* Set architectural direction and strategic tradeoffs that balance innovation, simplification, risk, and cost.

* Establish standards, guardrails and procedures while maintaining enterprise-wide placemats, reference architectures, and reusable patterns to enable scalability and modernization.

2. Architectural Governance & Leadership

* Lead and develop a high-performing Enterprise Architecture Management (EAM) function with global scope and technical depth.

* Define and enforce architecture principles, standards, and patterns that guide sustainable technology delivery across the organization.

* Chair a Global Architecture Review Board (ARB) with members from all tech, security, risk, legal and compliance functions to align architecture and solution adheres to standards and resolve cross-cutting architectural conflicts.

* Prepare strategic architecture decisions for senior executives, driving organizational commitment and alignment at the enterprise level.

* Develop and maintain architecture, governance processes, policies, and KPIs that ensure solutions are scalable, stable, cost-efficient, and value-driven.

3. Technology Scanning & Innovation Enablement

* Continuously assess market trends and emerging technologies, identifying those that offer competitive advantage or risk mitigation.

* Lead proofs of concept (POCs), architectural experimentation, and the scalable introduction of new technologies.

* Provide architectural guidance to evaluate, onboard, and operationalize new technology capabilities and platforms.

4. Strategic Business Partnership & Advocacy

* Represent Enterprise Architecture in executive and strategic forums; build trusted relationships with senior business, product, and technology leaders.

* Advocate architecture as a business enabler by linking design decisions to business outcomes and long-term value creation.

* Translate complex architectural issues into clear, compelling narratives for executive audiences and external partners.

* Promote architectural awareness and understanding across the organization through education, engagement, and thought leadership.

5. Product Enablement & Delivery Acceleration

* Partner with product, engineering, security, and data teams to embed architecture into agile delivery workflows.

* Enable faster delivery and innovation by reducing complexity, rationalizing systems, and improving interoperability across platforms.

* Monitor architecture debt, alignment, and outcomes through metrics tied to speed, value, quality, and risk reduction.

Ideal Candidate Profile

• 15+ years in enterprise architecture, technology strategy, and engineering in large-scale, regulated environments.

• Strong experience building and governing target architectures across complex, federated organizations ideally in fintech or global SaaS.

• Deep expertise in modern architecture paradigms: cloud-native, domain-driven design, event-driven and API-first architecture.

• Ability to align AI/ML strategies and architecture with strategic business priorities to drive measurable top-line revenue growth and bottom-line efficiency.

• Strong grasp of the intersection between AI, enterprise data strategy, and digital product design.

• Demonstrated success in balancing agility and governance; able to shift between conceptual thinking and tactical execution.

• Fluency in architecture modeling, reference frameworks (e.g., TOGAF, BIAN), and outcome-based architecture measurement.

• Exceptional communication and influence skills; capable of aligning C-level, engineering, and business stakeholders.

• Bachelor's or master's degree in computer science, Engineering, or related discipline.

Skills & Competencies

• Knowledge of business models, operating models, cost-benefit and trade-off analysis, and risk management.

• Balances the long-term ("big picture") and short-term implications of individual decisions and organization goals.

• Ready to think, behave and act in an innovative consulting manner to drive the organization's digital business strategies.

• Understands the regulatory and ethical considerations of data and AI on a scale across global markets.

• Trusted and respected as a thought leader who can influence and persuade business and technology leaders while being vendor- and technology-neutral and focused on achieving targeted business outcomes.

• Comfortable, experienced and accomplished at working with business executives, and able to push back in a professional way. Composed in the face of opposition to architectural principles, governance and standards.

• Highly innovative, collaborative and supportive of business and of its ideals and strategies.

Global Payments Inc. is an equal opportunity employer. Global Payments provides equal employment opportunities to all employees and applicants for employment without regard to race, color, religion, sex (including pregnancy), national origin, ancestry, age, marital status, sexual orientation, gender identity or expression, disability, veteran status, genetic information or any other basis protected by law. If you wish to request reasonable accommodations related to applying for employment or provide feedback about the accessibility of this website, please contact jobs@globalpay.com.