Company Overview The Irish Times Group (ITG) is Ireland's leading independent quality news publishing organisation.
The core activity of The Irish Times Group has evolved from six-day print publishing to a seven-day, multi-platform, digital first news and information publisher with a market-leading position in the development of subscriptions and maximising revenues.
We focus on producing quality content for our readers, providing media solutions for customers and we continue to grow and evolve in a fast-paced changing media landscape.
The Company is owned by The Irish Times Trust and is managed by The Irish Times DAC.
In recent years, the Irish Times Group expanded its interests to include the Irish Examiner, The Echo, Regional newspapers, in addition to the Citywest print facility,, ,, The Gloss and Score Beo.
Digitalisation is central to the strategy of the Irish Times Group.
We are investing in the people, data and technology that will build this digital value chain including integrated editorial, commercial and end user products. Role Summary The Enterprise Architect is a new role in the Data and Technology function in The Irish Times Group, reporting directly to the Chief Information Officer (CIO).
It will be the key role in developing a future state architecture for the Group's Technology and building an in-house software engineering profession.
The Enterprise Architect will have a key role in the selection of new technologies and choosing the buy/build/service adoption approach to delivering them in line with the principles of user centric design, digital first and cloud first.
The role will contribute significantly to the development of a Digital Vision for the Group and a user centric value chain showing the contribution of Data and Technology at each stage.
Specifically, it will focus on the design and iterative delivery of the underlying architecture.
The role will require specialist architecture and software engineering skills but will also need to include expert knowledge of Agile development and cloud computing.
Technical skills must be complimented by strong relationship building and communications.
Responsibilities will include: Architecture Design and Delivery Defining the future state connected architecture for the Technology estate (including editorial/publishing, commercial and consumer systems); Developing strategies to rationalise and simplify the Technology estate by identifying potential shared services; Leading the technical evaluation of new technologies and innovation in support of the Digital Value Chain, the Digital Vision and overall business strategy; Leading buy/build/adopt (services) selection decisions in support of business requirements, paying particular attention to the level of customisation to be applied around cloud services; Assessing technical debt across the estate and developing strategies to address it as appropriate.
Working closely with the Head of the Data profession to finalise the creation of a complete set of Data and Technology roles (e.g.
AI and Data Science) Architectural Governance Driving improvements in the maturity of development practices (Agile/POD/DevOps); Optimising Technology investments by identifying common standards and patterns to be applied at a project level; Overseeing each project and solution to ensure that architectural and regulatory standards are applied to deliver both business value and improved flexibility; Managing risk by anticipating the impact of Technology changes on the overall architecture (including, scalability, performance, flexibility and avoidance of technical debt); Evaluating Technology systems for weaknesses that could compromise performance, security and efficiency; Guiding the realisation of the future state architecture, achieving and maintaining a balance between growing business value and the agility of our systems.
Stakeholder Engagement Promoting the enterprise architecture in the context of its support for business goals - including developing graphical representations of the Technology estate and mapping alignment with business processes; Working with stakeholders (especially product owners) to ensure that each Technology decision contributes to realising the Data and Technology Vision and can be tied to organisation success.
This will include delivering projects and solutions in the optimal order; Building relationships with peers in the publishing industry and ensuring ITG considers emerging and established technologies that support our business strategy.
Role Requirements: Education: (NFQ Level 8) Degree in Computer Science, Information Systems, Engineering or equivalent. Skills and Experience: Deep expertise in Architecture design and delivery, including defining future state connected architectures for large technology estates. A working style which includes moving seamlessly from architecture and strategy to assessing and guiding how it is being implemented by development teams (at code level). Expert knowledge of Agile Development and Cloud Computing technologies. Proven skills and experience in driving improvements in Development practices and optimizing technology investments. Previous experience in providing technical leadership to development teams and an ability to influence senior leadership. Strong relationship building and communication skills to drive business strategy and contribute to organisational success. Experience of designing in and for a data rich environment. Detailed knowledge and strong experience of the people and technical change processes needed to deliver and embed digitalisation. The Irish Times operates a Hybrid working policy.
Our company benefits include Health Insurance, Pension Contribution, Sick Leave Cover, Maternity and Paternity Leave, Irish Times Premium Digital Subscription, Income Protection Policy, Corporate Gym Membership, Free Digital GP and Life Assurance Policy.