Head of Architecture - Midnight

Who are we?

IOHK, is a technology company focused on Blockchain research and development. We are renowned for our scientific approach to blockchain development, emphasizing peer-reviewed research and formal methods to ensure security, scalability, and sustainability. Our projects include decentralized finance (DeFi), governance, and identity management, aiming to advance the capabilities and adoption of blockchain technology globally.

We invest in the unknown, applying our curiosity and desire for positive change to everything we do. By fueling creativity, innovation, and progress within our teams, our products and services are designed for people to be fearless, to be changemakers.

About Midnight:

IOG's Midnight Tribe is a business technology provider and core contributor to the Midnight Network, a blockchain platform for developing decentralized applications that safeguard personal and commercial data. The Midnight Network is the first blockchain to offer programmable data isolation by leveraging zero-knowledge (ZK) proofs to enable selective disclosure of what information is visible on-chain and is designed to help developers implement necessary business policies, such as meeting regulatory requirements.

What the role involves:

As Head of Architecture for Midnight, you will be responsible for software architectures that allow engineering teams to faithfully implement the realization of emerging technologies, including IOHK’s own research projects. You can work closely with researchers and prototype engineers to evolve their work toward product readiness. You will work with engineering to ensure your architectures are appropriate and are used correctly. Working with Formal Methods, you will continuously improve our ability to deliver trustworthy and performant software against industry-standard timelines.

You will build your architecture organization from its small core to an influential unit within the Midnight community. You will recruit and develop talent as required and contribute significantly to the team culture, processes, and tools enabling your team to succeed.

You will work closely with the Engineering and Product teams, together with staff from Operations to

• Define the products and success criteria for projects as they transition from research to reality.
• Evaluate technical feasibility and define achievable scopes for ambitious, multi-component integrations.
• Identify research initiatives that would support and differentiate the portfolios.

This is a technical leadership position. You are expected to be a hands-on leader, developing appropriate technical architectures and design prototypes that you and your team will deliver to Engineering and will support through product delivery. Communication is an essential element of your success since it is the key to adopting and successfully utilizing your team’s output.

You will work closely with our research and prototyping partners as you shepherd their internal research projects through the handoff to your engineering team. You will maintain strong ties with the original authors as your development efforts raise new questions and possible new research directions.

You will work closely with formal methods technology to continuously improve our ability to deliver high-assurance software without compromising delivery timelines.

You will work closely with external vendors and contractors who can fill key technical gaps in your execution plans, developing formal statements of work and maintaining close ties throughout the resulting engagements.

While this is a technical position, it is also a senior leadership position. You will have management responsibilities for your team of Architects and Engineers.

This position will give you a comprehensive overview of Midnight's technical aspects. You will be expected to use this to assist the communications department when conveying technical information to our customers and community.

• Ensure the technical feasibility of projects.
• Help the Product Owner assess the commercial feasibility
• Propose and negotiate the project requirements
• Ensure the delivery of products as defined and on time
• Lead the architecture team to deliver and support successful software architectures and prototypes to the Engineering team
• Contribute technical and systems design expertise to assist in software application architecture, development, implementation, and testing. Driving architectural decisions and designing solutions to resolve challenging problems
• Working closely with the Engineering & Product Management, Project Management, DevOps, and Executive teams to deliver the product roadmap
• Contribute significantly to the team culture and processes that enable your team to succeed
• Recognize when training is worth the time and contribute to decisions on training
• Be conscious of the costs of architectural decisions and take these costs into account when jointly making important decisions
• Manage and evolve legacy solutions and integrate with legacy technology when appropriate.

Leadership

As Leaders, it is our responsibility to motivate, develop, and progress our fellow team members. As Leaders, you must communicate openly with all team members, address any issues head-on, and not shy away from difficult conversations.

Your top priority should be empowering your team to provide the best results by organizing clear processes and coordinating team efforts.

Requirements

Who you are:

• Experience architecting solutions to significant challenges in distributed systems, ideally in blockchain
• 10+ years of experience in the software industry
• Engineering / Computer Science advanced degree, ideally a PhD
• Experience developing architectures in multiple programming languages and programming models
• Experience defining, delivering, and supporting impactful software architectures to engineering teams
• Experience transitioning research into product
• Ability to evaluate the computational complexity of software systems
• Experience applying formal methods to computer software, such as symbolic model checking, formal semantics, or proof assistants
• Experience developing languages and compilers
• Experience with zero-knowledge technologies
• Familiarity with the research literature in distributed consensus
• Proven experience in people management
• Proven experience in strategic planning
• Experience mentoring and developing rising talent in the technology department
• Technical oversight
• Research/Innovation forecasting
• Software engineering
• Excellent communication skills
• Leadership skills
• People and Process management
• You maintain a level of technical excellence appropriate for the products we build.
• Good interpersonal skills so as to be able to relate with people or personnel from different units of the company

Are you an IOGer?

Do you find yourself questioning the status quo? Do you tinker with ideas and long to turn those ideas into solutions? Are you able to spark thoughtful debates, bringing out the inquisitiveness in others? Does the promise of continuously growing excite you? Then get ready to reimagine everything you thought wasn’t possible because that’s what it means to be an IOGer - we don’t set limits, we break them.

Benefits

• Remote work
• Laptop reimbursement
• New starter package to buy hardware essentials (headphones, monitor, etc)
• Learning & Development opportunities
• Competitive PTO

At IOG, we value diversity and always treat all employees and job applicants based on merit, qualifications, competence, and talent. We do not discriminate on the basis of race, religion, color, national origin, gender, sexual orientation, age, marital status, veteran status, or disability status.