Expert System Architect

At CN, everyday brings new and exciting challenges. You can expect an interesting environment where you’re part of making sure our business is running optimally and safely―helping keep the economy on track. We provide the kind of paid training and opportunities that long-term careers are built on and we recognize hard workers who strive to make a difference. You will be able to thrive in our close-knit, safety-focused culture working together as ONE TEAM. The careers we offer are meaningful because the work we do matters. Join us!

Job Summary

The Expert System Architect is a key resource in delivering platforms on behalf of IT and the business unit(s). The Expert System Architect creates strategic digital platform solutions that deliver tangible business results to enable CN’s digital evolution, integrations, and business strategy. Expert in designing and developing design-thinking solutions, they carefully combine the latest development methodologies, intelligent automation, and tools to deliver platform solutions. Ultimately, this enables the company to deliver innovative new capabilities seamlessly, swiftly, and efficiently.

Responsibilities

• Develop strategic digital platform solutions infused with AI and automation that deliver tangible business results.

• Bridge the hardware-software boundary by understanding principles of functional and solution architecture, as well as software development, and deliver them in cloud, private cloud, or hybrid clouds.

• Combine the latest DevSecOps methodologies and tools to enable the delivery of bespoke platform solutions.

• Champion how digital platform solutions, AI technologies, and advanced automation play a role in realizing strategic opportunities to improve customer experience and operational efficiency.

• Design and implement AIOps strategies to enhance system reliability, enable predictive maintenance, and drive automated incident resolution across the platform ecosystem.

• Use DevSecOps methodologies to streamline the delivery of projects cost-effectively, ensuring alignment with the business unit’s goals, timeline, and budget.

• Automate software development, software operations, and processes seamlessly, efficiently, and cost-effectively, heavily leveraging Infrastructure as Code (IaC) and hyper-automation principles.

• Improve software quality and accelerate software releases by adopting a culture, practice, and the tools designed to increase CN’s ability to deliver applications and services more rapidly.

• Integrate Artificial Intelligence (AI) and Machine Learning (ML) capabilities into platform architectures to drive innovation, optimize business workflows, and enable data-driven decision-making.

• Promote available platform capabilities and expertise to business unit leaders and educate them on how to leverage these capabilities (including AI and automation) to achieve their business goals.

• Work closely with Infrastructure, Operations, Data Science teams, and Business Units to refine requirements for various platform initiatives.

• Meet with stakeholders to identify fit-for-purpose solutions within CN’s existing ecosystem.

• Achieve customer success through strategic business outcomes, technology optimization, and ongoing organization enablement.

• Help CN stakeholders and internal users become better connected to digital capabilities, establishing an agreed-upon reference architecture and roadmap for implementation.

Requirements

• Bachelor's degree or more in computer science or related discipline.

• 10+ years' experience in IT.

• 5+ years in a similar role of work experience in platform architecture and digital transformation initiatives including yet not limited to planning, business architecture, solution development, data integration, platform modeling, automation, optimization, and quality assurance.

• Proven experience architecting and implementing AI/ML solutions, Intelligent Automation, and AIOps frameworks within an enterprise architecture.

• Strong ability to bring complex concepts to actionable architecture deliverables.

• Strong ability at taking hard decisions by understanding and explaining trade-offs between business enablement and economic impacts.

• The role requires people skills to influence and orient business and technical audiences toward a common goal that satisfies all stakeholders.

• Experience working in cross-functional teams and collaborating with business stakeholders in support of departmental and/or inter-departmental platform management initiatives.

• Ability to balance requirements and concerns from different stakeholders (business, finance, IT, Operations, etc.) and make efficient judgment calls, providing clear rationale for decisions.

• Ability to deliver mandate with great autonomy – self-driven, at the same time knowing when to reach out and how to provide adequate visibility.

• Ability to efficiently communicate with people of varying seniority and backgrounds.

• Capacity to engage on multiple concurrent initiatives efficiently.

• Curious and interested in acquiring knowledge over multiple new architecture concepts, business domains, and technologies (especially emerging AI trends).

• Capacity to perform with little or no prior knowledge of a project context, domain, or technologies.

• Experience with numerous architectural fields: application, information, technology, security, AI, etc.

• Experience with Agile implementation methodology and best practices in applying Agile to architecture activities.

• Excellent written and oral communications skills; French and English an asset.

• Knowledge with Service Oriented Architecture and Domain Driven Design.

Skills and Experience

• Strong experience in working with Cloud, open-source and commercial-off-the-shelf, API platforms (e.g., MuleSoft), and message queuing technologies such as Kafka, Databricks, and IBM.

• Deep expertise in DevOps, Infrastructure-as-Code (IaC), and advanced Automation tools (e.g., Terraform, Ansible, CI/CD pipelines via Microsoft Azure DevOps, Git).

• Strong practical knowledge of Artificial Intelligence (AI), Machine Learning (ML), Generative AI, and integrating these capabilities into platform services.

• Experience with AIOps tools and methodologies for proactive platform monitoring, anomaly detection, and automated remediation.

• Strong experience and skillset of Customer Experience Management, UI/UX and front-end application development with leading mobile and web frameworks, like Mobile Back-End as a Service (Kinvey), iOS (Swift), Android, Java, JavaScript, NativeScript {N}, TypeScript, REST, AngularJS, Angular, Node.js, Xamarin, .NET.

• Coding experiences on Java technologies, Python, database design, Data Analysis, and Chatbots.

• Good understanding and experience with popular database programming languages including SQL, others for relational databases, and on NoSQL like MongoDB, Cassandra, and Hadoop.

• Good experience in working with platform governance, quality assurance, and security teams, specifically information stewards and privacy and security officers in moving platform and relevant pipelines into production with appropriate quality, governance, and security standards (including AI governance).

Good experience in working across multiple deployment environments including public clouds, private clouds, and hybrid clouds, through containerization techniques such as Docker an

About CN
CN is a world-class transportation leader and trade-enabler. Essential to the economy, to the customers, and to the communities it serves, CN safely transports more than 300 million tons of natural resources, manufactured products, and finished goods throughout North America every year. As the only railroad connecting Canada’s Eastern and Western coasts with the Southern tip of the U.S. through a 19,500 mile rail network, CN and its affiliates have been contributing to community prosperity and sustainable trade since 1919. CN is committed to programs supporting social responsibility and environmental stewardship. At CN, we work as ONE TEAM, focused on safety, sustainability and our customers, providing operational and supply chain excellence to deliver results.

About CN

CN is a premium railroad that sustainably generates value for our customers, shareholders, employees, and stakeholders with an unwavering commitment to safety and service. Essential to the economy, to the customers, and to the communities it serves, CN safely transports more than 300 million tons of natural resources, manufactured products, and finished goods throughout North America every year. CN's network connects Canada's Eastern and Western coasts with the U.S. South through a 20,000-mile rail network. CN and its affiliates have been contributing to community prosperity and sustainable trade since 1919. CN powers the North American economy and is committed to programs supporting social responsibility and environmental stewardship.

At CN, we are dedicated to building North America's safest, most inclusive and sustainable railroad, which includes reflecting the communities in which we operate. Research shows that candidates often don't apply unless they feel they fit the job posting at 100%. To all potential applicants, even if you don't meet every job requirement listed in a posting, we still encourage you to apply. If you require an accommodation for the recruitment process (including alternate formats of materials, accessible meeting rooms or other accommodations), please get in touch with our team at cnrecruitment@cn.ca.

As an equal opportunity employer, qualified candidates will receive consideration for employment without regard to race, color, religion, sex, sexual orientation, gender identity, national origin, disability, protected veteran status, and other protected status as required by applicable law.

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