Lead Architect - Full Time

Lead Architect - Clapham Junction, United Kingdom

Full TimeRole: Lead Architect

Reporting to: Chief Technology Officer

Based: Hybrid - Clapham Junction 3 days per week

Here at The Gym Group we believe we are simply the best in our industry! Our amazing teams have skills, abilities and can-do attitudes that make this a great place to work! We have strong, embedded values and an easy-going culture which ensures we put our people first. We pride ourselves on being fun, innovative, inclusive and engaging. We are now on the lookout for an. We are now on the lookout for a Lead Architect.

So, what's stopping you? Apply today and be YOU with us!

What you need to know about us...

The Gym Group is not like your average gym! To our members we're the lowest cost nationwide 24/7 Gym with over 240 gyms and counting!
Our teams we are fun, welcoming, engaging and inclusive. We challenge our limits and push ourselves to impact positive change with our goals and initiatives. We take steps into new areas with a real and authentic purpose - It's our mission to break down barriers to fitness for all.

We're #1 in our industry when it comes to our values, our culture and our people - check out Glassdoor if you don't believe us. We offer a fantastic place to work in a great working culture. We have been recognised as by The Sunday Times as one of The Best Places to Work which is all down to our great leaders and exceptional teams.

We may be one of the leading budget gym chains in the UK but there's nothing budget about our investment into our people. We have retained GOLD in our investors in people award for the last 6 years and silver in wellbeing last year.
We're recognised as a disability confident and inclusive employer which is something we are truly proud of. We have a brilliant team and opportunities for development and growth with support for success. Having recently undertaken some huge projects from a digital point of view and our plans are to keep being innovative, creative and agile in all that we do.

About the role...

Reporting directly to the CTO, as the Lead Architect, you will shape the architectural blueprint that enables our technology vision. Guiding and coordinating a team of Solution Architects, Technical Architects, System Analysts and Solution Designers, you will maintain robust and comprehensive documentation of current and target states across our technology landscape. You will define and maintain our architectural governance model and specify the architecture toolset and frameworks. You will advise and inform the business, to optimise our Capabilities and Application Lifecycle. This is both a strategic and hands-on role: setting architectural vision, enabling scale, and ensuring technical excellence in execution. The role will engage your breadth and depth of experience across the whole technology domain.

Key responsibilities

• Own and evolve the enterprise architecture blueprint, reference architectures, and target state definitions
• Shape architecture principles and governance, driving alignment across business, data, applications, infrastructure, and security
• Lead technical decision-making across TGG's cloud platform including 3rd party integrations
• Act as the senior technical voice in executive and programme-level forums, influencing both strategic investments and day-to-day designs
• Drive architectural runway, risk management, and lifecycle planning to support growth, resilience, and innovation
• Foster architectural standards, documentation, and tooling adoption (e.g. C4, Archimate , UML, LeanIX )

About you...

We're looking for a strategic and accomplished Lead Architect to drive our technology architecture forward. You'll need to possess the following skills/experience

Strategic Architecture Leadership

• Extensive experience in enterprise and solution architecture for mid-to-large digital businesses.
• Proven ability to define and manage architecture governance, roadmaps, and standards.
• Strong influencing skills to align senior stakeholders and delivery teams with the architectural vision.

Cloud & Distributed Systems

• Deep fluency with Microsoft Azure, specializing in the architecture of scaled, cloud-native, and distributed systems.
• Expertise in designing for high-availability, fault tolerance, and auto-scaling patterns.
• Proficiency in designing secure, multi-tier applications using modern API and messaging protocols.

Software & Application Architecture

• Solid understanding of modern architectural patterns including DDD, Hexagonal Architecture, and CQRS.
• Proven ability to design and evaluate decoupled, microservice-based systems.
• Familiarity with a broad range of integration patterns and cross-cutting concerns.

Security, Data, and Performance

• In-depth knowledge of regulatory frameworks like ISO 27001, PCI DSS, and GDPR.
• Expertise in identity and access management, observability, and database architecture (SQL/NoSQL).

Tools & Methodologies

• Proficiency in architecture modeling standards like UML and C4.
• Strong understanding of modern engineering and DevOps practices.
• Experience with Agile and product-oriented delivery cultures

If you have a disability or condition that makes it difficult for you to complete your application online please email your cv to recruitment@thegymgroup.com or alternatively call the TGG Recruitment team on 0203 319 4838 and someone will be more than happy to support you. We also want to put it out there that we actively encourage applications from a diverse demographic and we are passionate about your culture and value alignment. We want this to be a match that works for you as much as for us!

Your application may be reviewed by an AI tool to help assess your suitability based on the information you provide. Automated decision-making is never used - every application is reviewed and all decisions, including whether to progress your application, are made exclusively by a member of our recruitment team. Your data will be handled in accordance with our Privacy Policy and UK GDPR. If you have any questions about how your information is used, please contact recruitment@thegymgroup.com .

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