Architecture Principal – Data & Analytics - HIH - Evernorth

Principal – Data & Analytics is a Band 5 Senior Contributor responsible for defining and advancing the enterprise data and analytics architecture strategy, target states, and multi-year roadmaps across the organization. This role serves as a recognized architecture authority , setting the northstar vision for modern data platforms, analytics, and AI-enabled capabilities—translating business priorities into pragmatic, scalable, and future-ready architectures . Operating with high enterprise influence and no direct reports, this role requires strong executive presence, the ability to influence without authority, and a relentless focus on enabling data-driven decision making, hyper-personalization, and AI-first innovation . Key Outcomes Enterprise Data & Analytics Vision: Define and publish a business-aligned data and analytics architecture strategy with a clear 3–5 year roadmap covering data platforms, governance, analytics, AI/ML, and integration layers.

About Cigna Group

• Evernorth Health Services Evernorth Health Services, a division of The Cigna Group, creates pharmacy, care and benefit solutions to improve health and increase vitality.
• We relentlessly innovate to make the prediction, prevention and treatment of illness and disease more accessible to millions of people.
• Join us in driving growth and improving lives.

Responsibilities

• Establish modern, modular data architectures that reduce fragmentation, promote reuse, and enable enterprise-scale analytics and AI.
• Implement architecture principles, guardrails, and decision frameworks to improve speed, consistency, and quality of analytics and data platform decisions.
• Enable analytics-ready data, semantic layers, and AI capabilities that accelerate insights, automation, and intelligent decisioning.
• Act as a unifying architecture leader across Digital, Data, AI, Security, and Business domains to ensure alignment on key investment and design decisions.
• Strategy & Architecture Leadership Define and evolve enterprise data & analytics architecture strategy, capability maps, and target-state designs .
• Develop and maintain multi-year roadmaps aligned to business outcomes, cost optimization, and innovation priorities.
• Establish a data-as-a-product and platform-based operating model .
• Data Platform & Analytics Architecture Architect modern data platforms (cloud data lakehouse, streaming, real-time pipelines, semantic/ontology layers).
• Define patterns for data ingestion, transformation, storage, access, and consumption .
• Enable self-service analytics , BI, and advanced analytics capabilities across the enterprise.
• Lead architecture for AI/ML platforms, feature stores, and model lifecycle integration .
• Data Governance, Privacy & Compliance Embed data governance, quality, lineage, metadata, and stewardship frameworks into architecture design.
• Ensure architectures support regulatory, privacy, and security requirements by design .
• Establish patterns for trusted, secure, and compliant data usage .
• & Emerging Capabilities Drive innovation in AI/ML, GenAI, agentic analytics, and intelligent automation .
• Evaluate and guide adoption of emerging technologies (e.g., knowledge graphs, semantic models, real-time decisioning).
• Lead proof-of-concepts and pilot initiatives for next-generation analytics capabilities.
• Governance & Decision Enablement Provide architecture leadership for high-impact data and analytics initiatives .
• Establish reference architectures, reusable patterns, and standards for enterprise adoption.
• Drive alignment across portfolios to reduce duplication and optimize investments.
• Delivery Partnership & Enablement Partner with engineering, product, and data teams to ensure architectures are executable, scalable, and cost-efficient .
• Enable adoption of modern engineering practices (DataOps, MLOps, CI/CD for data).
• Support vendor/platform strategy (e.g., lakehouse, cloud, third-party integrations).
• Talent & Community Leadership Serve as a mentor and thought leader across the architecture and data community.
• Drive adoption of best practices, patterns, and architectural discipline .

Requirements

• Required Skills & Experience Bachelor’s degree in computer science, Engineering, or related field.
• 18+ years of experience in enterprise architecture, data engineering, or analytics platforms.
• Proven success defining data/analytics architecture strategies, target states, and roadmaps .
• Deep experience in large-scale, regulated enterprise environments (e.g., healthcare, financial services).
• Strong ability to influence senior stakeholders without direct authority .
• Modern data platforms (Lakehouse, Data Mesh, Data Fabric) Cloud ecosystems (Azure, AWS, GCP) APIs, event-driven architecture, and streaming
• Data governance, security, and privacy frameworks AI/ML and advanced analytics platforms