Director of Solutions Architecture and Delivery

Director of Solutions Architecture and Delivery

Molaprise Africa | Accra, Ghana | Full-time

About the role

Molaprise Africa is seeking a senior solution architect and technical leader to advise government and enterprise clients, design integrated technology solutions and lead engineering teams through implementation and production handover across Ghana and other African markets.

You must independently translate client requirements into an end-to-end architecture, select appropriate products and services, and explain how the components work together. You will personally author and defend solution designs, provide engineers with implementation direction and remain accountable for technical quality through production handover. Strong technical fundamentals and recent practical engineering experience are essential; project coordination and vendor management alone do not meet the requirements of this role.

What you will do

Lead client discovery with executives, government officials and technical teams. Establish business processes, existing systems, data flows, budget and measurable acceptance criteria, including performance, availability, security and recovery requirements.

Develop solution proposals, demonstrations, tender responses and business cases with business development teams. Recommend named products and services, explain their fit and limitations, and validate integration, licensing, support and lifecycle assumptions.

Own architecture across applications, APIs, data, cloud or local infrastructure, networking and security. Personally produce architecture diagrams, deployment designs, integration contracts and documented design decisions. Establish design standards and review changes across engagements. Embed privacy, government data control, interoperability and data portability.

Turn the architecture into an implementation plan with work packages, dependencies, engineering estimates, test requirements and technical acceptance criteria. Direct engineers, vendors and partners through build, configuration, deployment and field implementation.

Review technical designs, configurations, infrastructure automation and critical application or integration code. Identify defects and security or reliability risks, give concrete corrections and troubleshoot complex issues with engineers.

Balance scope, cost, delivery schedule and technical quality. Resolve design disagreements and vendor constraints; communicate risks, options and decisions clearly to clients and leadership.

Establish release controls, monitoring, incident procedures, backup and disaster recovery. Verify production readiness, recovery tests, operational documentation and accountable handover to support teams.

Build local engineering capability through mentoring, design reviews and knowledge transfer. Support BPO technology delivery and the proposed entrepreneurship hub as needed.

Required technical capability

Strong solution architecture capability and practical fundamentals across all areas below are required. Bring deep implementation experience in at least two technical disciplines, such as cloud and infrastructure, applications and integration, data or security, and the ability to direct specialists across the remainder. Expertise in every listed product is not required. Explain component interactions, justify choices and identify implementation risks.

Solution architecture and product selection: translate functional and nonfunctional requirements into an end-to-end design; compare commercial products, custom development and managed services; assess compatibility, capacity, availability, supportability and total cost of ownership. Validate key assumptions through prototypes or technical investigations when needed.

Networking and infrastructure: TCP/IP, DNS, subnets, routing, VLANs, firewalls, load balancing, VPNs and private connectivity; enterprise compute, storage, virtualization and power resilience. Diagnose connectivity failures systematically and explain network boundaries and dependencies.

Cloud and hybrid design: substantial practical experience with Azure or AWS; select suitable compute, storage, database, identity, networking and monitoring services; design secure connections to existing systems and account for intermittent connectivity and local support constraints.

Security and identity: apply Zero Trust principles, least privilege, role-based access, MFA, privileged access controls, segmentation, encryption and secret management. Distinguish authentication from authorization and explain appropriate DDoS protection, application protection, logging and incident escalation.

Applications and integration: understand application layers, REST APIs, API gateways, OAuth 2.0/OpenID Connect, message queues and asynchronous processing. Design integration with ERP, CRM, HR, billing or payment systems, including timeouts, retries, duplicate prevention and reconciliation.

Data and databases: SQL and relational database fundamentals, schema design, keys, indexes, transactions and data integrity; data migration and integration pipelines; retention, access controls, auditability and reporting. Explain database choices and basic performance diagnosis.

Engineering review and troubleshooting: practical development or scripting experience in C#/.NET, Java, Python, JavaScript/TypeScript or an equivalent language. Read and critique code in a familiar language, trace failures and recommend corrections and meaningful tests.

DevOps and reliability: Git, CI/CD, environment separation, automated testing, deployment approvals, secrets, infrastructure automation, monitoring and rollback. Understand containers and when they are appropriate; assess backup and recovery against agreed recovery time and data-loss objectives.

Relevant platforms

Azure or AWS; Microsoft 365 and Entra ID; HPE, Cisco or comparable infrastructure; PostgreSQL or SQL Server; API and messaging platforms; GitHub Actions, Azure DevOps or GitLab CI; Docker and Terraform or equivalents. Product knowledge must be supported by an understanding of the underlying concepts.

Experience and qualifications

10+ years of relevant technology experience, including at least five years personally designing complex solutions and leading technical teams or client implementations.

A substantial engineering background in software, systems, cloud, networking, integration or a comparable discipline, with continued involvement in design reviews, implementation decisions and troubleshooting.

Proven personal architecture ownership and production delivery of solutions spanning multiple systems, vendors or organizations. Be able to explain the design, products used, integrations, technical decisions, delivery problems and operational results.

Experience advising government agencies, public utilities, regulated enterprises or comparable institutions. Strong executive communication, technical proposal writing and commercial judgment.

Understanding of Ghana or comparable African delivery environments, including power, connectivity, procurement, data control and local maintenance requirements. Willingness to travel regionally and collaborate across time zones.

Bachelor’s degree in Computer Science, Engineering, Information Systems or a related field, or equivalent substantial professional experience.

Preferred experience

Experience in digital government, citizen services, utilities, transportation, trade, public finance or public safety is valuable. GIS, IoT, edge computing, secure AI integration, model evaluation and human oversight are advantages. Relevant Azure or AWS architecture, TOGAF, networking or security certifications, sovereign hosting experience and French language capability are useful. Certifications complement demonstrated experience.

How candidates will be assessed

Shortlisted candidates will complete a live assessment with screen sharing: clarify requirements, draw their own architecture, recommend products and defend integration, security, deployment and recovery decisions. They will review an engineer’s implementation or code in a familiar language and recommend corrections and verification steps.

Prepare two examples of solutions you personally architected and helped deliver. Explain your contribution, product choices, integrations, a significant technical problem and measurable results. Supporting material must be anonymized and permitted for disclosure. Assessment will evaluate technical fundamentals and personal ownership alongside client and delivery leadership.

How success will be measured

Credible proposals supported by feasible designs, appropriate product choices and realistic cost and delivery assumptions; key design risks resolved before implementation.

Engineering teams receive clear technical direction and deliver against agreed scope, quality, budget and acceptance criteria.

Secure and reliable production systems with tested recovery, useful monitoring and effective operational handover.

Client adoption, measurable service improvements and stronger local engineering capability through knowledge transfer.