Special Assistant/Digital Transformation Architect Vacancy ID #204788

Duties Description

Duties Description

As the Digital Transformation Architect, your role will be to maintain competitiveness and responsiveness in an increasingly digital landscape, the New York State Department of State (NYSDOS) must adopt transformative technologies and strategies that align with its evolving business goals. The role of the Digital Transformation Architect is crucial in this endeavor, assisting in modernizing our technological ecosystem and service delivery-platforms. This role is critical in driving innovation, improving operational efficiency, and enhancing citizen engagement through technology. This position serves as a bridge between business strategy and technology execution, ensuring that projects are being delivered on time and on/under budget, and digital solutions are scalable, secure, and aligned with the objectives of Agency Transformation. By driving innovation, streamlining processes, increasing efficiency, and fostering collaboration across departments, the Digital Transformation Architect plays a vital role in shaping the future of the Division and ensuring long-term success in a rapidly changing environment.

Specific Duties Include, But Are Not Limited To

• Design, document, and implement enterprise-wide digital transformation strategies aligned with agency goals. Develop and track key performance indicators (KPis) and success metrics to evaluate the impact of digital initiatives.
• Manage digital modernization projects, policy alignment, data harmonization, and application rationalization within scope, cost, and time constraints.
• Oversee the evolution of interdependent systems, applications, and digital services in step with the continuous improvement of agency operations they support.
• Integrate Software Development Lifecycle (SDLC) best practices into all phases of solution development, from requirements gathering to deployment and maintenance.
• Define, develop, and implement testing strategies to ensure system reliability, performance, and compliance.
• Collaborate with cross-functional teams to gather requirements and deliver solutions.
• Ensure compliance with federal and state cybersecurity and data governance standards.
• Coordinate vendor activities with the Office of Information Technology Services {ITS) to assure proper engineering consultation, cybersecurity review/policy adherence, system/application testing, and deployment.
• Develop and manage project plans, track milestones, report progress to stakeholders, and provide situational awareness via the project portfolio management dashboard.
• Prepare and facilitate project meetings, working sessions, and stakeholder briefings. Report project status, risks, and outcomes to executive sponsors and senior leadership. Identify, document, and mitigate project risks and dependencies.
• Work with the Department's offices, divisions, and units to develop information technology-related Requests for Proposal and other contractual documents that engage vendors. Participate in vendor selection and contract negotiations.
• Where necessary, recommend alternatives to the Director and Deputy Director when vendors are not meeting expected deliveries and projects slip off agreed-upon timelines.
• Provide technical leadership and mentorship to junior Business System Analysts and Project Managers.
• Facilitate the architectural reviews and contribute to the development of best practices. Stay informed about emerging technologies and assess their applicability to NYSDOS operations
  
  

Minimum Qualifications

Minimum Qualifications

Bachelor’s degree and five years of relevant professional experience. Two of those years must have been in a supervisory capacity over professional staff.

Substitutions: Four years of specialized experience or associate’s degree and two years of specialized experience may substitute for bachelor’s degree; J.D. or master’s degree may substitute for one year of specialized experience; Ph.D. may substitute for two years of specialized experience.

Specialized experience includes experience in a combination of the following:

• Managing information technology vendors and contracts.
• Analyzing business policies and processes.
• Supervising IT projects, resources, including budgeting/contract payments.
  
  

Preferred Qualifications

Ten years of experience in the areas of specialized experience listed above, including, but not limited to:

• Strong understanding of accessibility standards, open data principles, and digital equity considerations.
• Experience in Service design, user experience (UX), customer experience (CX),
  
  

and/or human-centered design methodologies.

• Experience developing and managing performance dashboards and analytics tools such as Tableau, SAS Visual Analytics, Business Intelligence, or SAS Viya.
• Cloud migration planning and execution, including legacy system modernization and hybrid cloud strategies.
• Implementing and managing DevOps practices, including Cl/CD
  
  

pipelines, infrastructure as code (laC), automated testing, and deployment automation.

• AWS Solutions Architect or Microsoft Azure Solutions Architect certification.
• Experience implementing performance-based contracts, including developing and monitoring quality assurance surveillance plans as defined in FAR 37.6 or comparable agile procurement/oversight practices.
• Experience using LEAN, Agile, and other modern project delivery methodologies to streamline processes and improve outcomes.
  
  

Applicants should submit a resume, cover letter and transcript(s) that clearly demonstrate how they meet the minimum or preferred qualifications for the position.

Additional Comments

The Department of State is proud to be an equal opportunity employer. We encourage women, people of color, LGBTQ individuals, people with disabilities, members of ethnic minorities, foreign-born residents, and veterans to apply. We celebrate diversity and do not discriminate based on race, religion, color, national origin, sex, sexual orientation, gender identity and/or expression, age, veteran status, disability status, arrest record or criminal conviction history, or any other category protected by law.

We are happy to provide reasonable and religious accommodations during the hiring process for those in need. If you have a disability or special need that requires accommodation, please send a request to HRM.Recruitment@dos.ny.gov.