Chief Architect - Product Engineering

Aderant is a global industry leading software company providing comprehensive business management solutions for law firms and other professional services organizations with a mission to help them run a better business. We are motivated by a collective desire to drive the legal industry to the forefront of innovation. With over 2,500 clients around the world, including 95 of the top AmLaw 100 firms, we are changing the outside perception of the legal sphere; where there was once resistance to modernization, we are creating a culture that embraces new ideas and technology.

At Aderant, the “A” is more than just a letter. It is a representation of how we fulfill our foundational purpose, serving our clients. It embodies our core values and reminds us that to achieve success, every day must start with the “A”. We bring the “A” to life by fostering a culture of innovation, collaboration, and personal growth. We encourage our diverse teams to bring their whole selves to work – ideas, experience, and passion – to drive our mission forward.

Our people are our strength.

The Chief Architect owns the technical architecture vision and execution across Aderant's product portfolio, modernizing the ongoing evolution of our overarching application and platform architecture into a scalable, cloud-native SaaS environment with AI, data, and security at its core. This role is the company's trusted architecture strategist, driver, and collaborator to Product Management, App Engineering, Platform Engineering, and Cloud Operations and is equally comfortable working hands-on through challenging technical problems and hands-off, advising and governing at the portfolio architecture level. The Chief Architect can lead either through direct management of a shared architecture team or through a dotted-line model with embedded architects, and is comfortable representing and influencing architecture decisions with both C-level and senior technical law firm team members.

Core Focus Areas

• SaaS: Move the platform from legacy and on-prem models to true multi-tenant, cloud-native SaaS.
• App Architecture: Set standards for services, APIs, and infrastructure that scale and are secure by design.
• AI: Design how AI and agentic capabilities integrate safely across products.
• Data: Own technical data architecture across the portfolio, including modeling, governance, and access models.
• Cloud: Lead multi-cloud infrastructure strategy with deep domain expertise in AWS and Azure.
• Network: End-to-end network standards, from physical through application layers, balancing scalability and security.
• Infrastructure: Set standards for infrastructure-as-code, observability, and disaster recovery.
• Security: Secure-by-design principles embedded across architecture, in partnership with InfoSec and GRC.

What You'll Do

• Set Aderant's technical architecture strategy across SaaS, cloud, AI, data, network, infrastructure, and security.
• Translate strategy into standards, guardrails, and reference patterns that Product Management, App Engineering, Platform Engineering, and Cloud Operations build against.
• Bring technical judgment into Product Management's roadmap conversations, informing trade-offs without owning the roadmap.
• Represent the architecture vision to clients, from CIO/CTO-level briefings to technical deep dives.
• Get hands-on with design reviews, prototypes, and challenging technical problems when needed.
• Set standards for how App Engineering and Platform Engineering extend the core platform and AI backbone.
• Lead adoption of AI and agentic patterns into product architecture, working directly with engineering teams on integration.
• Partner with Cloud Operations on infrastructure resilience, cost efficiency, and operational standards.
• Collaborate with Platform teams on cross-portfolio governance, data access, integration, and scalability decisions.
• Partner with InfoSec and GRC to define and enforce security controls and compliance requirements.
• Run recurring architecture and security review processes across product teams, surfacing risk early.
• Mentor senior engineers and resolve cross-product architecture conflicts.

Experience

• 12+ years in software architecture, including 5+ years as an enterprise or chief architect.

• Experience architecting multi-tenant SaaS platforms across multiple cloud providers.

• Track record leading a legacy-to-cloud or on-prem-to-SaaS transition at scale.
• Hands-on experience architecting AI and ML-integrated products.
• Strong background in data architecture, governance, and strategy.

• Solid grounding in network and infrastructure architecture, including zero-trust and IaC.

• Deep knowledge of application security, with experience partnering directly with InfoSec and GRC.

• Track record advising both product and engineering leadership on technical strategy and outcomes that support technical and business outcomes.

• Comfortable engaging clients at both the C-level and technical level.

• Experience leading architecture through both direct management and dotted-line influence.
• Experience with AI tools and processes that benefit the technical and business outcomes of the product, engineering and client outcomes.

• Legal tech or vertical SaaS background.

• Experience with M&A-driven product consolidation.
• Familiarity with compliance frameworks such as SOC 2 and ISO 27001.
• Technical stakeholder management across Product, App Engineering, Platform Engineering, and Cloud Operations.

Results Driven