Principal Forward Deployed Architect

Working at Atlassian

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About the Role

The Forward Deployed Architect (FDA) is a trusted transformation architect who combines enterprise-grade technical design with consulting-grade business acumen to shape how strategic customers adopt Atlassian as their operating system for work.

This is not a traditional Solutions Engineer role nor a hands-on-keyboard engineering role. The FDA is the architect in the room the person who turns a CIOs ambiguous modernize how we work into a credible phased AI-native architecture and the business transformation plan that makes it stick across HR Finance Marketing PMO Operations and Engineering.

You will be embedded with 13 strategic accounts at a time typically for 39 months each owning both the technical truth and the business transformation narrative end-to-end. This role will report into the Head of Solution Architects and will require up to 50% travel.

Business Transformation & Expansion

• Design the customers System of Work across functions using Jira Confluence Rovo and the broader Atlassian platform.

• Lead process and workflow transformation from current state to future state including operating model design Center of Excellence structures RACI governance and platform team design.

• Expand Atlassian beyond the development buyer into HR Finance Marketing PMO Operations and other business teams through cross-functional workflow design.

• Drive AI adoption for knowledge workers through practical workflow-based use cases embedded into daily work.

• Support adoption through change management enablement and success metrics.

• Own and evolve the System of Work blueprint based on outcomes feedback and usage data.

Architecture & Technical Design

• Own the target-state architecture for strategic enterprise customers across the Atlassian System of Work Plans Goals Work Knowledge Code and AI (Rovo Teamwork Graph Atlassian Intelligence).

• Design across the full stack: multi-tenant SaaS identity & SSO (SAML/OIDC/SCIM) data residency integration patterns (REST/GraphQL/event-driven) Forge & Connect app strategy Marketplace ecosystem and migration paths (Server/DC Cloud Cloud-to-Cloud).

• Co-design AI-native workflows Rovo agents knowledge grounding Teamwork Graph enrichment AI governance and human-in-the-loop patterns.

• Ship durable artifacts reference architectures ADRs Forge prototypes Terraform/IaC modules Compass scorecards automation rule libraries that survive past the engagement.

Orchestration & Influence

• Lead executive discovery with CIOs CTOs VPs of Engineering and Heads of Platform translating business outcomes into capability roadmaps and phased delivery plans.

• Orchestrate execution across SE SA TAS/FDE Professional Services Partners and customer stakeholders.

• Close the loop with Product capture patterns from the field and convert them into prioritized well-articulated product and platform requirements.

• Mentor and uplevel Senior Solutions Engineers Professional Services Architects and Partner architects.

• Represent Atlassian externally through conference talks reference architecture publications and Developer Community contributions.

Required

• 812 years in customer-facing technical advisory consulting or transformation roles.

• A track record of owning and delivering end-to-end transformations at Fortune 1000 large regulated or public sector customers not only scoping them.

• Executive presence and exceptional written communication; able to produce a memo ADR or design doc that stands up to executive review.

• Strong workflow and systems thinking including the ability to map complex processes and design scalable ways of working across business functions.

• Comfort with enterprise architecture concepts: cloud-native design integration patterns identity security and data.

• Ability to prototype debug and read code in at least one of: Java/Kotlin TypeScript/Node Python.

• Cross-functional credibility with IT PMO HR Finance and senior business stakeholders.

• Willingness to travel up to 50% and operate across customer time zones.

Strongly Preferred

• Deep cloud-native architecture experience on AWS or equivalent hyperscaler including multi-region multi-tenant SaaS identity security and data.

• Prior experience at a SaaS vendors Forward Deployed Customer Engineering or Professional Services team.

• Or senior architect / Principal Consultant experience at a major SI or Atlassian Solution Partner with a track record of leading platform transformations.

• Management or technology consulting background including Big 4 boutique or internal strategy.

• Domain depth in one or more of: DevOps / Platform Engineering ITSM/ESM Agile-at-Scale FSI Public Sector Healthcare.

• Experience designing on Forge the Atlassian Marketplace ecosystem or large Atlassian Cloud migrations.

• AI/LLM architecture experience including RAG knowledge graphs agent design and AI governance.

• Relevant certifications such as ACP AWS Solutions Architect Professional TOGAF or CISSP.

• Public artifacts including conference talks open source contributions published reference architectures or blogs.

Compensation

At Atlassian we strive to design equitable explainable and competitive compensation programs. To support this goal the baseline of our range is higher than that of the typical market range but in turn we expect to hire most candidates near this baseline. Base pay within the range is ultimately determined by a candidates skills expertise or experience.

In the United States we have three geographic pay zones. For this role our current base pay ranges for new hires in each zone are:

Zone A: $207000 - $270250

Zone B: $186300 - $243225

Zone C: $171800 - $224308

This role may also be eligible for benefits bonuses commissions and equity.

Please visit for more information on which locations are included in each of our geographic pay zones. However please confirm the zone for your specific location with your recruiter.

Benefits & Perks

Atlassian offers a wide range of perks and benefits designed to support you your family and to help you engage with your local community. Our offerings include health and wellbeing resources paid volunteer days and so much more. To learn more visit Atlassian

At Atlassian were motivated by a common goal: to unleash the potential of every team. Our software products help teams all over the planet and our solutions are designed for all types of work. Team collaboration through our tools makes what may be impossible alone possible together.

We believe that the unique contributions of all Atlassians create our success. To ensure that our products and culture continue to incorporate everyones perspectives and experience we never discriminate based on race religion national origin gender identity or expression sexual orientation age or marital veteran or disability status. All your information will be kept confidential according to EEO guidelines.

To provide you the best experience we can support with accommodations or adjustments at any stage of the recruitment process. Simply inform our Recruitment team during your conversation with them.

To learn more about our culture and hiring process visit line with local law identity verification (which may include use of biometric data) is a condition of employment with Atlassian for employment fraud purposes.