Senior Director, Solutions Architecture — Americas

Job description

Who are we? Cohere is the leading security-first enterprise AI company. We build cutting-edge foundation AI models and end-to-end products that are designed to solve real-world business problems. We’re training and deploying frontier models for enterprises who are building AI systems. We believe that our work is instrumental to the widespread adoption of AI and we are looking for folks that want to be part of that. We obsess over what we build. Each one of us is responsible for contributing to increasing the capabilities of our models and the value they drive for our customers. Cohere is a team of researchers, engineers, designers, and more, who are all passionate about their craft. We are a global technology company headquartered in Toronto with key offices in London, New York City, San Francisco, Montreal, Paris, Berlin and Seoul. Join us! As the Senior Director of Solutions Architecture for the Americas at Cohere, you will own the US and Canada commercial Solutions Architecture function. You will lead the team that turns enterprise interest in agentic AI into deployed, production systems, and you will be accountable for the technical win in the most competitive AI market in the world. The United States and Canada are our largest commercial opportunity, and this seat owns how we win them. You will take an established, distributed team of strong technical people and raise what it can do — setting the bar and establishing the operating rhythm that lets a team of generalists run consistent, industry-fluent plays at enterprise scale. You will set direction for the function, sit on the Solution Architecture leadership team alongside the regional leaders for EMEA and Asia Pacific, and contribute to company-wide decisions with your peers across Sales, Product and Engineering. IN THIS ROLE, YOU WILL: - Lead and Scale the Organization: Build, coach and develop a high-performing Solutions Architecture organization across the US and Canada, and grow the senior technical talent within it. - Own the Technical Win: Be personally accountable for the technical outcome of the region’s most strategic pursuits, and be in the room for the ones that decide the year. - Own the US Market: Lead how Cohere positions, proves and sells into US enterprises — our largest commercial opportunity, and the market this seat is measured on. - Extend Our Reach: Grow the share of the region’s pipeline the team is technically leading, and make sure we are engaged early on the opportunities that matter most. - Own the Number with Sales: Partner with regional Sales leadership as a co-owner of the region’s number, not as a support function to it. - Set Direction for the Function: Define the vision, strategy and operating model for Americas Solutions Architecture, and hold your leaders accountable for delivery and execution against it. - Build Repeatable Solution Practices: Establish scalable solution-selling methodologies, industry playbooks, executive narratives, business cases and technical delivery frameworks that improve consistency and win rates. - Architect Enterprise AI Solutions: Guide customers in designing secure, scalable, production-ready agentic AI solutions across cloud, hybrid, VPC and on-premises environments. - Shape Product Direction: Partner closely with Product and Engineering to translate customer feedback and market needs into platform improvements and roadmap priorities. - Attract Talent to Cohere: Bring senior technical field talent with you and continue to attract it. Building the bench is part of the job, not a consequence of it. KEY RESPONSIBILITIES: - Lead and develop the Americas commercial Solutions Architecture team through coaching, hiring, performance management and career development. - Partner with regional Sales leadership to pursue and close strategic enterprise opportunities across financial services, healthcare, energy, technology and other key verticals. - Own the region’s technical coverage model, and ensure the team is engaged early and consistently on the opportunities that matter most. - Lead executive workshops, discovery sessions, solution presentations and technical deep dives with C-suite and senior customer stakeholders. - Develop business cases, solution architectures, implementation roadmaps and technical proposals that align customer objectives with Cohere’s platform. - Guide customers through the deployment of enterprise AI solutions, ensuring scalability, security, governance and operational readiness. - Create repeatable solution assets, industry playbooks and best practices that enable the team to consistently deliver high-quality customer engagements. - Collaborate cross-functionally with Product, Engineering, Sales and Customer Success to ensure alignment between customer needs and platform evolution, and contribute to decisions that reach beyond your own function. - Serve as the voice of the field by capturing customer feedback and competitive insights that influence product strategy. - Own and report on the region’s operational and commercial metrics, including technical win rates, pipeline health, coverage and team performance. WHAT WE’RE LOOKING FOR: - Leadership Experience: 15+ years in Solutions Architecture, Solutions Engineering, Technical Consulting or Enterprise Architecture, including 7+ years leading customer-facing technical teams, and a record of developing people into senior and leadership roles. - People Leadership: A proven record of hiring, coaching and developing high-performing Solutions Architecture or Solutions Engineering teams, and of building or transforming an organization rather than inheriting a healthy one. - Executive Presence: You command a room. You are credible in front of a CEO and their business leaders, the people who own the problem and the budget, and equally credible in front of a Chief Information Officer, a Chief AI Officer or a Chief Information Security Officer. You can move between the business case and the architecture without losing either audience. - Hands-On Technical Credibility: You are technical enough to be believed by a strong engineering bench. You work with models and agents yourself, you can pressure-test your team’s architecture, and you can be the most useful person in a design conversation when it matters. This is a player-coach seat, not an overlay. - Commercial Acumen: A demonstrated ability to partner with enterprise Sales leadership, influence strategic deals, and articulate business value to executive stakeholders. You have carried a number and can point to deals you personally moved. - Consulting Mindset: Experience leading complex enterprise solution engagements, developing business cases, implementation plans and executive-ready recommendations. - Technical Expertise: A strong understanding of modern AI architectures, including large language models, agentic systems, retrieval, enterprise integrations, cloud platforms, hybrid and on-premises deployments, security and governance. - Enterprise Experience: Experience designing and delivering enterprise technology solutions in complex, regulated or large-scale environments. - Cross-Functional Influence: A record of contributing to decisions beyond your own function, and of working effectively with Product and Engineering leadership. PREFERRED QUALIFICATIONS: - Experience building or turning around a regional technical field organization, and evidence of what changed as a result. - Background in enterprise AI, cloud, or data platform companies, or applied AI consulting organizations. - Experience supporting customers in regulated industries such as financial services, healthcare, energy, or the public sector. - Experience building repeatable solution-selling methodologies and helping generalist technical teams operate at a consistently high level. - A network of senior technical field talent you can attract to Cohere. - Experience operating in high-growth environments where speed, ownership and cross-functional collaboration are critical. FULL-TIME EMPLOYEES AT COHERE ENJOY THESE PERKS: - A weekly lunch stipend of $75/£75 or equivalent in your local currency for lunch. - Full health and dental benefits, including a separate budget for mental health. - RRSP matching, 401K, Pension Scheme. - 100% Parental Leave top-up for up to 6 months, for either parent. - Annual enrichment benefits: Arts & culture, fitness/wellness, quality time, and a workspace improvement credit. Education & learning stipend for conferences, courses, and coaching. - 6 weeks of paid vacation (30 working days!) - Budget for traveling to other offices if you are remote, plus an annual company offsite. HOW AND WHERE WE WORK: - Cohere is remote-friendly, but we also have offices in Toronto, London, New York City, San Francisco, Montreal, Paris, Berlin and Seoul with more opening soon. - For those in the office: a daily lunch program, plenty of snacks, and regular community and social events. - For those not near an office: a co-working benefit so you can work alongside others in your city. - Everyone receives a $500 home office stipend to set up your workspace properly. If any of the above doesn’t line up exactly with your experience, we still encourage you to apply. We strive to create an inclusive work environment for all; we welcome applicants from all backgrounds and are committed to providing equal opportunities. Should you require any accommodations during the recruitment process, please submit an Accommodations Request Form https://docs.google.com/forms/d/12a6IrLdF3kI2nonKSr4tiFuz18rLQbaeYV-JM9L4o9Q/edit, and we will work together to meet your needs. We may use AI-enabled tools to screen and assess applicants against the criteria for this position. This helps our recruiters identify potentially qualified candidates, but it doesn't limit the applications our recruiters may review or consider. Beware of Scams: Cohere will never ask for payment or third-party services (e.g., CV writing) as part of our hiring process. All legitimate roles are listed on the Cohere careers page and LinkedIn only, with all communications from Cohere employees coming from an @cohere.com or @cw.cohere email alias. If jobs are viewed on other sites then please verify these through our official careers https://cohere.com/careers page.