Solution Architect

Company: Lumen
Location: Charlotte
Posted on: February 1, 2025

Job Description:

About Lumen Lumen connects the world. We are igniting business growth by connecting people, data and applications - quickly, securely, and effortlessly. Together, we are building a culture and company from the people up - committed to teamwork, trust and transparency. People power progress. Lumen's commitment to workplace inclusion and employee support shines bright. We've made the Newsweek 2024 Greatest Workplaces for Diversity list and achieved a perfect score of 100 on the Human Rights Campaign Corporate Equality Index (CEI) for the fifth consecutive year. Plus, we're the top employer in the communications and telecom industry, ranking 12th overall across all industries in The American Opportunity Index. We're looking for top-tier talent and offer the flexibility you need to thrive and deliver lasting impact. Join us as we digitally connect the world and shape the future. The Role
We are looking for Solution Architect who are passionate about leveraging technology innovation for the betterment of humanity. This exciting customer-facing solution engineering role will work in partnership with our Sales & Customer Success Executives, leading innovative conversations that help shape the growth of our enterprise customers as they embrace the 4th Industrial Evolution. Solution Architect design and architect solutions utilizing our technology services platform. The successful Solution Architect must have a strong desire to leverage their technical and sales skills, including business acumen, to understand business requirements, develop a technical sales strategy, and effectively present solutions that address our customers' requirements and provide business value. -- The Solution Architect will be responsible for analyzing customer needs and requirements through strategic discovery, utilizing technical thought leadership, discussing industry best practices, and presenting our product offerings to prospects and customers based on each customer's specific business requirements. Recommending and proposing solutions to our customers with a goal to become a trusted advisor by highlighting how our products solutions enabling digital business strategies.-- The Main Responsibilities

• Customer Meetings: Leads and attends customer meetings in person and via collaboration tools. Prepares and delivers technical proposals and presentations with the appropriate level of business acumen for the audience. Provides broad scope responses to solution and technology questions. Demonstrates advanced solution selling abilities and effective, pro-active customer communications. Interacts with all levels of customer's management team.
• Customer Solution Development: Analyze and identify our customer's business and technology objectives, conduct full technical discovery, and architect client solutions to meet gathered requirements. Assess business and operations impacted by technology. Craft and propose custom solutions that differentiate Lumen's services, and meet customer's requirements and objectives by asking probing questions that are meaningful to the customer to collect information that enables the sales team to be more effective and responsive to customer's needs. Independently completes highly complex and custom designs.
• Internal and External Training: Advises customers, sales and customer success on technical aspects of proposed solutions including fit to customer's needs, features, availability, etc.--
• Thought Leadership: Internal feedback loop to product management, sales and customer success leadership teams regarding the customer experience, product features/functionality, and service implementation/management.--
• Customer Advocate: Acts as customer advocate, participating in pre-sales efforts including technical sales presentations, architecture design discussions, proof-of-concept engagements, RFP/RFI responses, solution demonstrations, and technical workshops. Deliver findings including key pain points, proposed solutions to meet business needs, and ROI where applicable. Contribute to development of technical sales strategy. Design, architect and demonstrate visionary solutions in a way that closely reflects our customers technology roadmap.
• Lifecycle / Ecosystem Partnership: Support local sales teams in pursuit of key business opportunities, engage customers to address aspects of the data lifecycle. Collaborate with Client Success Executive/Manager, Solution Sales Overlay teams, and Product Management to deliver the appropriate solution and establish credibility and trust with the customer. What We Look For in a Candidate
  
  • Education: B.S. Computer Science, Engineering, MIS or equivalent work experience in the private sector or military
  • Work experience: Minimum 5 years of experience with technology focused in pre-sales, engineering, consulting or similar background.
  • General Experience: Technical pre-sales and/or consulting experience with a progressive track record of increasing levels of solution complexity and responsibility. Able to develop relationships and communicate with senior level customer technical staff and line of business executives. Demonstrated ability to provide consultative guidance and solution design to large enterprise or government customers.
  • Technical Knowledge: Possess knowledge of Enterprise Architecture and Design with ability to act autonomously across multiple technology areas. Demonstrated proficiency of technical solution knowledge across a minimum three of the four Lumen technology pillars (global network infrastructure, edge cloud capabilities, connected security, communication and collaboration services).
  • Communication: Ability to independently orchestrate & lead discussions with clients across many levels including C-level, VPs and Directors within IT.
  • Sales Ability: Ability to understand the economic implications of a technical solutions. Can lead discussions with internal stakeholders to construct Total Cost of Ownership & evaluate Return on Investments for large enterprise customers when identifying & crafting customer solutions. Ability to lead complex deal discussions with internal ecosystem including sales, customer success, product & engineering that consider not only technical design but also the customer experience requirements and implications throughout the stages of the customer journey, crafting solutions that achieve the customer's desired business outcomes with sophisticated operational models across multiple Lumen technology pillars.
  • Approach: Highly proactive, consultative, creative and positive with a can-do attitude even in the most difficult circumstances.
  • Problem Solving: Expert problem-solving skills and ability to methodically understand and resolve complex issues across multiple products to integrate into a seamless customer solution. Must demonstrate the ability to focus ambiguous customer needs into specific, deliverable requirements. Must demonstrate creative solution development.--
  • Work Style: Ability to work independently, part of a team or pull together and lead a team to build complex customer solutions. Must be able to build strong team relationships and easily transfer technical information. Ability to work under pressure with tight deadlines and on multiple projects simultaneously. Must be very detail oriented and demonstrate a high degree of accuracy. Attention to detail with good organizational capabilities. Ability to prioritize with good time management skills.
  • Presentation Skills: Excellent presentation skills as well as the ability to build and present high-quality solutions to both technical and executive audiences that articulate the business value of the technical solution.
  • Strong listening, reasoning, and objection handling skills.
  • Some Travel required.
  • Desired Skills:
    • Industry certifications: In 2 or more specialized technologies.--
    • Experience in solution consulting - ITIL.
    • Strong understanding in Cloud & Architecture design.--
    • Strong understanding in Network Functions Virtualization.--
    • Strong understanding in Security solutions.-- Compensation
      This information reflects the anticipated base salary range for this position based on current national data. Minimums and maximums may vary based on location. Individual pay is based on skills, experience and other relevant factors. Location Based Pay Ranges:
      $121,559.00 - $162,068.00 in these states: NC. Lumen offers a comprehensive package featuring a broad range of Health, Life, Voluntary Lifestyle benefits and other perks that enhance your physical, mental, emotional and financial wellbeing. We're able to answer any additional questions you may have about our bonus structure (short-term incentives, long-term incentives and/or sales compensation) as you move through the selection process. Learn more about Lumen's: Requisition #: 336506 Background Screening If you are selected for a position, there will be a background screen, which may include checks for criminal records and/or motor vehicle reports and/or drug screening, depending on the position requirements. For more information on these checks, please refer to the Post Offer section of our FAQ page . Job-related concerns identified during the background screening may disqualify you from the new position or your current role. Background results will be evaluated on a case-by-case basis.
      Pursuant to the San Francisco Fair Chance Ordinance, we will consider for employment qualified applicants with arrest and conviction records. -- Equal Employment Opportunities We are committed to providing equal employment opportunities to all persons regardless of race, color, ancestry, citizenship, national origin, religion, veteran status, disability, genetic characteristic or information, age, gender, sexual orientation, gender identity, gender expression, marital status, family status, pregnancy, or other legally protected status (collectively, "protected statuses"). We do not tolerate unlawful discrimination in any employment decisions, including recruiting, hiring, compensation, promotion, benefits, discipline, termination, job assignments or training. -- Disclaimer The job responsibilities described above indicate the general nature and level of work performed by employees within this classification. It is not intended to include a comprehensive inventory of all duties and responsibilities for this job. Job duties and responsibilities are subject to change based on evolving business needs and conditions. -- In any materials you submit, you may redact or remove age-identifying information such as age, date of birth, or dates of school attendance or graduation. You will not be penalized for redacting or removing this information. -- Please be advised that Lumen does not require any form of payment from job applicants during the recruitment process. All legitimate job openings will be posted on our official website or communicated through official company email addresses. If you encounter any job offers that request payment in exchange for employment at Lumen, they are not for employment with us, but may relate to another company with a similar name. Application Deadline
      02/15/2025

Keywords: Lumen, Columbia , Solution Architect, Other , Charlotte, South Carolina