City : Waterloo

Category : Full-time

Industry : Finance

Employer : Sun Life Financial

You are as unique as your background, experience and point of view. Here, you’ll be encouraged, empowered and challenged to be your best self. You'll work with dynamic colleagues - experts in their fields - who are eager to share their knowledge with you. Your leaders will inspire and help you reach your potential and soar to new heights. Every day, you'll have new and exciting opportunities to make life brighter for our Clients - who are at the heart of everything we do. Discover how you can make a difference in the lives of individuals, families and communities around the world.

Job Description:

The Director, Business Architecture, will be responsible for developing the strategic business architecture of the Canadian Operations organization (encompassing processes, technologies, services, and capabilities), and developing solutions, that are in alignment with business strategic goals & objectives.

This role will represent business interests and partner with Sun Life Financials’ technology groups to ensure the right solutions are identified, designed, developed, implemented, and maintained. This role will need to understand the current state of business and operational processes and develop the right sequence of phases to evolve to a successful Target Operating Model to enable Canadian Operations to achieve their strategic & operational objectives, ensuring consistency, efficiency and quality.

What you will do:

• Develop and maintain a business architecture strategy and roadmap for Canadian Operations, aligning business goals & objectives with corresponding business & IT solutions, incorporating a continuous improvement focus. 
• Evaluate new technologies in partnership with Enterprise Services and identify optimal solutions that align with Operations strategy & roadmap.
• Identify opportunities for continuous improvement and innovation by monitoring and evaluating current state results & trends.
• Fully assess impacts of proposed changes and make appropriate recommendations to senior management.
• Provide business architecture leadership to Operations portfolio of projects.  Oversee the definition, development, and implementation of solutions from a business architecture perspective.   Provide guidance to project teams to ensure effective use of tools & technologies as well as alignment with business strategy & roadmap.
• Accountable for business solution design: strategically examining business needs and solution alternatives, to ensure an integrated view of the business translates into final solution designs that are effective, generate positive results and fit within the architectural and business vision and framework.
• Monitor implementations and results, ensuring that the desired benefits are successfully achieved.  Ensure tools, best practices, consistent methods, policies, and standardized processes are leveraged with a focus on quality and efficiency. 
• Work closely with application architects and developers and other key ES representatives to ensure business needs are clearly communicated and understood and solutions developed to effectively meet those needs.
• May be required to build and provide leadership to a sub-team of business analysts focused on business architecture. This includes hiring, performance management, career growth, coaching and cultivating team culture
• Provide leadership, business analysis oversight and business process support to maintain, enhance or develop new business technology solutions and roadmaps with a view to accomplishing the strategy, vision/mandate of the Business Unit and or Operations group towards greater efficiency, quality and strong customer focus.
• Demonstrate deep knowledge and expertise of the technology applications that support the business and serve as key liaison with IT to represent business priorities, provide business requirements, participate in user acceptance testing, and release management. Serve as a bridge between business and technical requirements. 
• Proactively engage other Enablement Leaders on business technology solution development for knowledge sharing, input and best practices.
• Provide leadership and/or partnership for key Strategic Initiatives, as required

What you need to succeed:

• Strategy development and management
• A thought leader, inquisitive and comfortable in challenging the status quo
• Experience in design and modeling of business solutions
• Demonstrated leadership, decision-making and team performance management skills
• Deep analytical skills including effectively using modeling tools and methodologies to fully understand the business need
• Diligent about enforcing standards and best practices and able to communicate benefits to stakeholders
• Ability to find commonality across projects, to ensure streamlining of work, consistency and maintainability of solutions
• Seasoned relationship builder with strong interpersonal skills
• Executive level presentation skills - written and oral - to effectively communicate and influence at all levels within the organization
• Ability to lead through influence in a complex and evolving environment, to meet challenging timelines and organizational goals
• Extensive knowledge and understanding Project Management practices and disciplines, tools, and methodologies
• Experience partnering with IT for overall solutioning and delivery
• Demonstrated strength and ability to design and implement processes and standards
• Strong relationship management skills and ability to foster strong internal relationships with leaders across Canadian Operations as well as Functional or Business leaders across SLF
• A university degree in business and/or an IT discipline
• Undergraduate or Post Graduate degree in Business/Commerce or Business Administration would be an asset

Leadership competencies

• Visioning – identifying short, mid and long-term goals and championing the implementation of different or alternative ideas, advances business strategies and anticipates stakeholder impacts and reactions
• Organizational Savvy – recognizing and understanding organizational politics and working organizational dynamics to accomplish objectives
• Customer Focus – anticipating customers' need and designing, promoting or supporting the delivery of products and services that exceed customer expectations
• Planning and Organizing – organizing and planning work according to business needs by defining objectives and anticipating needs and priorities, taking a big picture perspective, making strategic decisions
• Influencing and Persuading – clear communication to convince others, from senior management to IT to business representatives, to adopt a course of action
• Innovation – generating creative solutions to problems that will result in improved performance and outcomes, continuously developing knowledge of industry, trends and developments, understands the role of technology and can extrapolate solutions from one project/system/process to another
• Teamwork and Collaboration – working and collaborating with others towards a common goal
• Drive for Results – challenging and pushing the organization and self to excel and achieve, going beyond incremental improvements, anticipating obstacles and ways to overcome
• Champion of Change – taking action to support and implement change initiatives effectively
• Resilience – dealing with work-related problems, pressure, and stress in a professional and positive manner
• Negotiation – identifying the needs and motives of both parties involved in working towards mutually beneficial agreements
• Manage complexity – critically examines the accuracy of underlying assumptions and translates complex information into business needs and solutions

Assets

• Deep understanding of technology and ability to translate business needs into technology capabilities and effectively communicate that translation
  •    Strong business acumen and analytical capabilities – ability to consolidate information into clear, concise analysis in support of business decisions
  •    Strong financial management skills and fluency with the financial aspects of business operations 
  •    Forward thinking and strategic thinking capabilities in order to support the business in executing on strategy  Experience in the financial services industry with an understanding of operational  management practices and objectives including accountabilities, approaches to problem solving, industry trends and best practice
• 10+ years of relevant work experience

What's in it for you?

• Excellent growth projection with a potential to bring about change and reforms in the industry
• Excellent benefits that include 20 vacation days per year, Pension, Stock and Savings Program to help build and enhance your future financial security
• Strong potential for developing leadership and organizational skills

The Base Pay range is for the primary location for which the job is posted.  It may vary depending on the work location of the successful candidate or other factors.  In addition to Base Pay, eligible Sun Life employees participate in various incentive plans, payment under which is discretionary and subject to individual and company performance.  Certain sales focused roles have sales incentive plans based on individual or group sales results. 

Diversity and inclusion have always been at the core of our values at Sun Life. A diverse workforce with wide perspectives and creative ideas benefits our clients, the communities where we operate and all of us as colleagues. We welcome applications from qualified individuals from all backgrounds.

Persons with disabilities who need accommodation in the application process or those needing job postings in an alternative format may e-mail a request to thebrightside@sunlife.com.

At Sun Life we strive to create a flexible work environment where our employees are empowered to do their best work. Several flexible work options are available and can be discussed throughout the selection process depending on the role requirements and individual needs.

We thank all applicants for showing an interest in this position. Only those selected for an interview will be contacted.

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