Principal Cloud Architect

Principal Cloud Architect UK Why This Role? This is a senior technical leadership opportunity for an experienced cloud architect who wants to shape major cloud transformations, strategic bids and complex customer solutions. You will act as a delegated design authority across high-value and high-risk engagements, ensuring cloud solutions are secure, scalable, commercially viable and deliverable. Working across presales and delivery, you will influence architecture strategy at engagement level, advise senior customers and improve architecture capability across the wider team. What You’ll Be Doing Lead the cloud architecture strategy for strategic accounts, major bids, RFPs and complex transformation programmes. Act as a delegated design authority for high-value, high-risk or technically ambiguous cloud engagements. Shape enterprise cloud solutions across Azure, AWS, landing zones, migration, modernisation, security, resilience, governance and FinOps. Translate complex business requirements into secure, scalable, supportable and commercially viable architecture recommendations. Provide programme-level architecture direction across multiple projects, workstreams and technical dependencies. Assure complex solution designs and ensure alignment between presales commitments, programme architecture and delivery outcomes. Advise senior customer stakeholders on cloud strategy, transformation roadmaps, architecture options and technical risk. Work with commercial, portfolio, engineering and delivery teams to challenge assumptions and improve solution viability. Support architecture governance, design reviews and Architecture Review Board activity for strategic engagements. Develop reusable reference architectures, design patterns, accelerators and architecture guidance. Mentor Cloud Solutions Architects and Senior Cloud Solutions Architects, improving design quality and consistency across the team. Identify opportunities to use automation and AI to improve architecture productivity, assurance and reusable solution development. What We’re Looking For Essential Significant experience leading architecture for complex, enterprise-scale cloud transformations. Expert knowledge of public cloud architecture, with strong Azure or AWS experience and relevant multi-cloud awareness. Experience operating as a senior design authority across complex, high-risk or commercially sensitive engagements. Strong knowledge of cloud landing zones, migration, modernisation, cloud-native architecture and cloud operating models. Deep understanding of cloud security, identity, networking, resilience, observability, automation, governance and FinOps. Proven experience leading the technical strategy for major bids, RFPs, proposals or strategic customer opportunities. Ability to define architecture roadmaps, solution options, reference architectures, design patterns and governance approaches. Strong understanding of platform engineering, DevOps,…