eFinancialCareers

• Company

  Rand Merchant Bank

• Location

  South Africa-Johannesburg

• Compensation

  Competitive

• Position Type

  Employee

• Employment type

  Full time

• Updated

  18 Nov 2008

• eFC Ref no

  475100

The Enterprise Architect will have responsibility for the bank's business architecture and building the bank's capabilities in business analysis. He/she will also be responsible for setting up a Centre of Excellence in business analysis.

RAND MERCHANT BANK

Rand Merchant Bank (RMB) is the investment banking arm of FirstRand, one of South Africa’s largest, listed financial services groups.

Rand Merchant Bank (RMB) is the investment banking arm of FirstRand Bank; in 30 years RMB has grown from a small financial structuring house into a market-leading investment bank. RMB trades off FirstRand Banking Group's R547 billion balance sheet (2007), which gives them the best of both worlds - the agility of an investment bank backed by the muscle of a large financial services group.

For the year ended 30 June 2007, RMB delivered 81% growth off an already high base, with pre-tax profits nearly trebling in the past five years and have achieved an average annual compound growth rate of 31% since 1985.

In South Africa, RMB operates from offices in Johannesburg, Cape Town, Durban and Port Elizabeth. Internationally, RMB operates through its parent company, the FirstRand group, from offices in the United Kingdom, Ireland, the United Arab Emirates, China, India, Australia, and North and South America as well as regional offices in Namibia, Botswana, Swaziland, Lesotho and Mozambique.

RMB is rated as “South Africa’s leading investment bank*” and is a full-service investment bank delivering the whole range of services including:                              * by PriceWaterhouseCoopers in the 2005 Peer rankings of financial institutions.

• Corporate finance
• Structured finance
• Private equity
• Trading and client solutions in
• currencies,
• credit,
• commodities
• equities and
• fixed income.

"As the employer of choice, we've built a solid reputation among clients as the investment bank of choice."

Michael Pfaff, CEO

Seeing profit growth of at least 20% every year since its formation, RMB has developed a reputation for combining innovation and entrepreneurship and has pioneered the introduction of many new financial instruments to the local and African markets in support of its philosophy of Traditional values, Innovative Ideas

OUR CULTURE

RMB’s expertise and approach to business, is neatly captured in the 21 year old payoff line “Traditional Values. Innovative Ideas.” At its most basic, this describes the bank’s ability to be bold and innovative whilst sticking to the principles of sound, prudent banking.

Employees thrive in RMB’s dynamic workplace culture, which is geared towards empowering the individual, making employees accountable and rewarding performance. Divisions are run as businesses in their own right. People are respected and rewarded for their contribution rather than their titles and positions.

As our aim is to to be continually recognised as the number one investment bank in Southern Africa, we are looking to recruit the best talent the markets have to offer - someone with extraordinary intellect, a business driver, significant market expertise and motivation. We also believe that it is vital to invest in the growth and future of our employees because it is integral to our own success.

Critical Performance Areas:  

The Enterprise Architect will have responsibility for the bank's business architecture and building the bank's capabilities in business analysis. He/she will also be responsible for setting up a Centre of Excellence in business analysis. The Enterprise Architect's role will encompass:

• Create a vision for Enterprise Architecture at the Bank by taking into account the business and information technology strategies and the requirements of the business users;
• Define the processes, information flows, functional requirements and data designs;
• Define the governance processes for adherence to the enterprise architecture;
• Identify tools, methodology's, standards and best practices for business analysis and enterprise architecture;
• Create a centre of excellence for enterprise architecture, business analysis and data analysis;
• Guide the establishment of shared services and standardisation where this makes commercial sense;
• Provide adequately skilled resources to the various projects in the bank, including business process re-engineering, business analysis, data analysis and information management skills;
• Guide the bank to the "to be" vision of enterprise architecture by liaising with the business unit's and ensuring their adoption of the enterprise architecture;
• Work closely with the technical architects in defining the systems landscape in the bank.
• Establish and co-coordinate the activities of the Business Architecture Forum;
• Coach and advise business analysts and architects who are deployed in the various projects and business units.

Qualifications and Experience:

• Post graduate relevant degree or 15 years experience in the field.
• 8-10 years demonstrated practical experience in major projects / areas with high level exposure to business architecture functions.
• Leadership of teams.
• Strong background in implementation of build and buy business solutions.
• Experience in the investment banking sector either directly or as a consultant.

Competencies Required:       

Enterprise or Business Architecture:

• In-depth knowledge of business analysis and architecture methods. Must be able to conceptualize at high level but also to drill down to low level of detail.
• Expert in conceptual reasoning & process orientation.
• Experienced in service oriented architectures.
• Excellent analytical skills, ability to solve difficult problems with effective solutions.

Leadership and Strategic:

• Provide clear structure and direction, be in control and empower, lead, coach and motivate teams to succeed.
• Be highly influential and impart respect in his/her field at all levels, have high energy levels and charisma.
• Be assertive, decisive with the ability to drive resources to focus on goals and on delivery.
• Show innovation in the role; be open to other views and continuous improvement.
• Be flexible and adaptable but strong to drive debate on business requirements and achieve fast consensus and decision making on proposed business solutions.
• Ability to assess risks and issues and be able to ascertain the best way to mitigate those risks or address those issues.
• Facilitate and drive the conceptualization of business solutions and have the highest standards of quality for the provision of business architecture and testing services.

Management:

• Extensive knowledge of management process and methodology's.
• Very good planning and co-ordination skills of complex initiatives showing organizational agility.
• Strong project and process management orientation, analytical skills and attention to detail.
• Ability to “follow through”.
• Some understanding of technical architecture and systems, technologies, databases and development languages.

Problem and Conflict Management:

• “Can do” problem solving approach to challenges.
• Able to manage and resolve conflict at all levels.
• Must be able to understand implications of an option / solution and determine the impact on the organization.

Communication and People Skills:

• Very good communication skills (verbal and written).
• Expert in JADing and facilitation skills.
• Be able to negotiate at all levels regarding enterprise architecture.
• Very good people management and presentation skills.
• Listen very well, talk clearly, be transparent and straight.
• Be able to integrate all type of business information from internal and external sources and translate it in a concise manner and using a simple language.

Personal Qualities:

• Fast and efficient and be able to multitask.
• Be able to manage pressure and tight deadlines.
• High level of stress tolerance and results focused.
• Must feel comfortable with complexity and with conceptual as well as practical thinking process.
• Must be a team player with the ability to be independent and self reliant. 
• Have passion for liaising with clients (BUs) and must be driven by customer service.
• Inquisitive, innovative and analytical.