Principal, Solution Architect

LPL Financial • San Diego, CA

10d • Hybrid

About The Position

Where Ambition Meets Innovation Build a career that matches all your initiative with an impressive dose of innovation. From cutting-edge resources and a collaborative environment to the freedom to make an impact and more, you’ll find the ingredients you need at LPL Financial to shape your success while helping clients pursue their financial goals. Job Overview: LPL Financial is seeking a Principal Architect to provide architecture leadership for the Account Lifecycle Management (ALM) domain, with a primary focus on data architecture, domain modeling, and lifecycle-aligned platform capabilities. Account Lifecycle Management (also referred to as Client Lifecycle Management) encompasses the end-to-end management of a client and account relationship—from initial acquisition and onboarding, through active usage and servicing, ongoing monitoring and compliance, retention, and ultimately compliant offboarding. In this role, you will define target-state architectures, guide solution designs, and partner closely with product, engineering, data, and risk stakeholders to ensure ALM capabilities are scalable, secure, compliant, and aligned to business outcomes.

Requirements

• 10+ years of experience in architecture roles (e.g., domain, enterprise, solution, or data architecture) within complex technology environments.
• 5+ years strong expertise in data architecture, including: Conceptual and logical data modeling Integration and data contract design Data governance concepts such as lineage, quality, stewardship, and retention
• 5+ years experience designing architectures that support end-to-end lifecycle workflows (e.g., onboarding, servicing, compliance, and closure).
• 5+ years experience influencing without authority and drive alignment across multiple teams and stakeholders.
• Excellent communication skills, with the ability to clearly articulate architectural intent, tradeoffs, and recommendations.

Nice To Haves

• Experience in financial services or other regulated industries, particularly with client or account lifecycle processes.
• Familiarity with domain-oriented architecture approaches (e.g., bounded contexts, event-driven patterns).
• Experience balancing business agility with regulatory, risk, and operational constraints.

Responsibilities

• Domain Architecture Leadership Serve as an architecture leader for the Account Lifecycle Management domain, defining how systems, data, and integrations support each stage of the lifecycle. Establish and evolve target-state architectures, reference models, and transition roadmaps that balance near-term delivery with long-term platform sustainability. Provide architectural guidance across initiatives spanning onboarding, servicing, compliance, lifecycle events, and account closure.
• Data Architecture & Information Modeling (Primary Focus) Define and govern canonical data models, lifecycle entities, and key events that represent client and account state changes. Establish architectural direction for: Data ownership and system-of-record decisions Data flows, contracts, and integration patterns between ALM capabilities and adjacent domains Data lineage, quality, retention, and auditability Partner with engineering and data teams to ensure architectures support regulatory expectations, operational transparency, and analytics needs.
• Solution Architecture & Delivery Enablement Translate business and regulatory requirements into clear architectural guidance, including reference architectures, design patterns, and decision records. Review and influence solution designs to ensure alignment with domain architecture, enterprise standards, and non-functional requirements. Enable delivery teams by providing guardrails that accelerate execution while reducing architectural risk and rework.
• Risk, Compliance, and Operational Readiness Embed architectural patterns that support risk management, regulatory compliance, and auditability throughout the account lifecycle. Ensure designs account for operational needs such as resiliency, observability, scalability, and supportability in production environments.
• Collaboration & Stakeholders Partner with product leaders, engineering teams, and delivery organizations responsible for ALM capabilities. Collaborate with enterprise architecture peers across domains and shared platforms. Engage with security, risk, and compliance stakeholders to ensure architectural decisions meet regulatory and governance expectations. Communicate effectively with both technical and non-technical audiences, including senior leadership.

Benefits

• LPL Total Rewards package is highly competitive, designed to support your success at work, at home, and at play – such as 401K matching, health benefits, employee stock options, paid time off, volunteer time off, and more.

What This Job Offers

• Job Type: Full-time
• Career Level: Principal
• Education Level: No Education Listed