Principal Solution Architect

The Executive Office of Health and Human Services is comprised of 11 agencies and the MassHealth program. EOHHS seeks to promote the health, resilience, and independence of the nearly one in every three residents of the Commonwealth we serve. Our public health programs touch every community in the Commonwealth.

About the role

The IT team within the Executive Office of Health & Human Services is hiring a Solution Architect to support our agencies with creative solutions to challenging public-sector technology challenges. We’re looking for someone who can help us think outside of the box and is comfortable getting into the weeds of technical decision-making when necessary to deliver innovative solutions to our service delivery needs and challenges.

Your first major initiative in this role will be to help MassAbility transform the way the agency delivers services to people with disabilities. In this role, you will provide technical leadership, support, and direction to MassAbility as they undergo an agency-wide technology transformation. You will work with experience owners, designers, researchers, and vendors to define a technical direction and set MassAbility up for success.

MassAbility is focused on building a fit-for-purpose service ecosystem - one that may combine configurable platforms, custom capabilities, integrations, data services, and modern engineering practices - to create a solution designed around how stakeholders both inside and outside the agency actually work together. MassAbility’s ambitions span their public presence and the way people research and apply for services, the way their program teams manage relationships and services with participants and partners, the agency’s financial operations, and more.

This position is a full-time contract role. The work schedule is Monday through Friday, 9 a.m.-5 p.m. eastern time, in a hybrid arrangement.

About EOHHS

The Executive Office of Health and Human Services works with many of Massachusetts’ most vulnerable residents. We support individuals with intellectual and developmental disabilities; older adults; blind, Deaf, and hard of hearing residents; those struggling with substance use disorders, mental illness, or co-occurring illness; refugees and immigrants; system-involved youth; survivors of sexual assault, domestic violence, and human trafficking; and so many more people throughout the Commonwealth.

Our 23,000 employees work hard to decrease health disparities, build a strong social safety net, fight hunger and food insecurity, address social determinants of health, support our workforce, and increase the accessibility and affordability of care. We provide access to medical and behavioral health care, substance use disorder treatment, long-term services and supports, and countless nutritional and financial benefits. We connect older adults and individuals with disabilities with employment opportunities, housing, and supportive services.

All told, EOHHS services and supports impact every single Massachusetts resident - and our agencies and programs directly serve 1 in every 3 residents.

About MassAbility

MassAbility empowers people with disabilities to live life on their own terms. Our programs and services expand possibilities in careers and training, home and community life, and legal rights and benefits - including disability determination for federal programs.

MassAbility is a bustling agency with a diverse array of programs and locations all over the Commonwealth. We partner with people with disabilities - and what we do benefits everyone. Our dedicated staff (many of whom are former MassAbility participants themselves) work closely with our program participants to tailor our services to their individual needs and then connect them to a large network of employers and third-party service providers who help them achieve their independent living and employment goals.

We know that inclusivity is good for society, good for business, good for our culture. When we break down barriers, we make life better for all.

What you’ll do

The ideal candidate will provide technical leadership, helping translate business and user experience goals into secure, scalable, flexible, and sustainable solution designs. You’ll collaborate with business, technical, data, security, experience design and research, end users, and vendor teams to guide the development of MassAbility’s new technology.

Responsibilities

Be the owner and final decision-maker for the design of the agency's technology solutions

You will architect technology solutions that align service designs with technology best practices and with the policies of the Commonwealth's IT, accessibility, and legal governance bodies.

You will lead the evaluation and selection of technologies and development approaches. You will help your partners in the service transformation to understand the practical implications of these choices.

You will manage the responsible use of AI-enabled automation in both the solution itself and in DevOps.

Your work will include the design of data processes that integrate external enterprise systems (e.g., Comptroller enterprise accounting system) into the MassAbility ecosystem. You will find creative and accurate ways to clean, transform, and migrate legacy data sources.

Build an organized, efficient, and creative team

You will collaborate with the experience design team and program staff to create a continuous improvement process that ensures iterative, agile, people-centered product development.

You will maintain people-friendly documentation spanning policy, design, process, and key decisions. You will establish predictable and repeatable processes for peer review, quality assurance, automated testing, and application management.

Manage delivery

You will scope and oversee the technical work of combined Commonwealth and vendor teams, reviewing and approving ideas and work at all stages of the delivery process.

You will keep other members of the transformation team apprised of timelines, progress, and risks, and will be relied upon to identify and translate relevant concerns back and forth between technical and non-technical teams.

Minimum Qualifications

You've delivered real value to stakeholders

• You are great at translating business goals, user needs, and policy or operational requirements into practical architecture and technical guidance.
• You have five or more years of experience working with cross-functional teams applying an iterative, agile, people-centered product design and development approach.
• You are a strong leader, communicator, and coach, whether you are working with technical or non-technical audiences, or managing up, down, or across.

You are comfortable being a thought leader in the face of technical complexity

• You have eight or more years of experience in IT delivery, systems implementation, software engineering, enterprise technology, or technology architecture, with five years spent as a technical solution architect, enterprise architect, engineering leader, or similar.
• You have experience with legacy system modernization, including re-architecture for mission-critical or regulated enterprise systems.

You have great hands-on technical skills

• You can build and contribute to technical prototypes and proofs of concept, including using AI-assisted development tools.
• You have experience with cloud-based enterprise applications, modern integration approaches, APIs, data architecture, security controls, and accessibility considerations.
• You are comfortable jumping in to do fine tuning at any stage of the end-to-end DevOps process. You may have experience using or evaluating generative AI or AI-assisted tools to support requirements analysis, design review, documentation, development practices, testing, code review, data migration, or quality assurance.

Preferred knowledge and skills

• An interest in helping the public and building accessible experiences.
• Modern tools and programming languages. We would like you to have deep hands-on experience with a few of these things, familiarity with most, and willingness to be proactive and learn about these or other technologies:
• Customer Relationship Management/Case Management-type platforms.
• REST API frameworks in your preferred language(s).
• Relational database systems and data warehouses.
• CI/CD tools for your preferred language(s).
• Automated testing frameworks for your preferred language(s).
• AI-assisted software development and code-generation practices.
• Modern cloud-based and modular architecture patterns.
• Data migration, data transformation, and legacy-system transition strategies.
• Analytics and reporting tools.
• Amazon Web Services.

Research suggests that qualified candidates may self-select out of opportunities if they don't meet 100% of the job requirements. We encourage individuals who believe they have the skills necessary to thrive to apply for this role. We want to hear from you!