Business / Functional Integration Architect
Payments & Benefit Cards Program
Context
For a strategic payments and benefit cards program, we are looking for an experienced Business / Functional Integration Architect. The primary focus of this role is to understand, structure, and steer all the integrations of the complete functional ecosystem—from overall business perspective to technical implementation and integration teams.
This role requires someone who can grasp the bigger picture, clearly explain how all components interact (both functionally and technically), and use that understanding to provide direction, alignment, and leadership across teams.
We are not looking for the technical champion, we are looking for the functional champion, who knows how to translate this to technical team, and guide the teams to implementation.
Role Description
The Business / Functional Integration Architect will be responsible for:
- Understanding and designing the integrations in the end‑to‑end functional ecosystem of the payments/benefit cards program
(issuer processor, acquirers, issuer, card schemes, partners, back‑office, settlement, reporting, etc.). - documenting functional collaboration models (i.e. “the integrations”) between parties, including:
- functional goal of the integration(s)
- ownership – who is realizing the interfaces
- Defining and aligning functional agreements regarding:
- key business data exchanged between systems
- message structures and integration protocols
- synchronization, orchestration, and handshake mechanisms.
- Clearly explaining the overall architecture and interaction model to multiple teams:
not only what an individual interface does, but why it exists, how it fits into the end‑to‑end flow, and what happens before and after. - Providing non‑hierarchical, content‑driven leadership to multiple teams, including:
- identifying and aligning owners
- safeguarding scope, coherence, and dependencies
- tracking progress and integration readiness.
- Actively contributing to the organisation and governance of the implementation, including:
- weekly follow‑ups and coordination meetings
- chasing actions and deliverables
- capturing issues and risks
- ensuring blockers are resolved, directly or via the appropriate owners.
- Taking functional end‑to‑end ownership of accounting, reconciliation, and invoicing flows across the entire ecosystem, including defining target operating models, making cross‑party flows transparent, aligning with finance, business and technical stakeholders, and ensuring consistency between business logic, data flows, and financial outcomes.
Profile
- Proven experience as a Business and/or Integration Architect in payments and/or card‑based ecosystems.
- Strong domain knowledge of payment cards, e.g. issuing, processing, settlement, reconciliation, card schemes, and transaction lifecycles.
- Experience with complex multi‑party integrations where business, operations, and IT intersect.
- Ability to structure complexity and document it in a clear, comprehensible way.
- Strong communication skills and credibility with both business and technical stakeholders.
- Hands‑on mindset: takes ownership, follows up, and drives progress.
Practical Information
- Contract type: external consultancy (freelance or via consulting partner)
- Duration: 1 year with possibility to extend
- Start date: as soon as possible
- Location: hybrid (to be agreed)