Client CTO – Higher Education

This is a fully remote position, open to applicants in California.

📋 Description

• Delivers presales solution architecture services to significant and strategically vital clients and client groups.

• Takes the lead in crafting complex, customized solutions that align with client requirements and Unisys offerings, frequently integrating emerging technologies.

• Creates and presents high-level presentations and demonstrations, clearly conveying the value of proposed solutions to senior managers and decision-makers.

• Collaborates with sales, product development, and engineering teams to ensure proposed solutions meet business objectives, guaranteeing technical feasibility and optimal client results.

• Manages and contributes to the preparation of technical responses for RFPs and RFIs, ensuring submissions are competitive and technically robust.

• Assesses potential risks to ensure solutions adhere to operational standards, security protocols, and relevant regulations.

• Cultivates enduring client relationships by providing reliable advice and insights from both technical and operational viewpoints.

• Acts as a trusted technology advisor to leadership in higher education, including campus CIOs, deputy CIOs, and central system stakeholders, with a solid grasp of shared governance models, academic culture, and decentralized IT environments typical in public university systems.

• Guides solution architectures that enhance core higher education systems such as Student Information Systems (SIS), Learning Management Systems (LMS), identity and access management (IAM), research computing, and campus administrative platforms, ensuring interoperability and long-term viability.

• Ensures proposed solutions comply with higher education regulatory and policy standards, including FERPA, CSU systemwide policies, State of California requirements, and digital accessibility mandates (e.g., Section 508, ADA).

• Navigates intricate procurement, funding, and approval pathways, including public-sector RFPs, multiyear funding cycles, grant-funded projects, and decision-making authority within large university systems.

• Collaborates with academic, administrative, and IT stakeholders to balance innovation with operational stability, acknowledging the dual mission of higher education institutions to support instruction, research, and student services.

• Offers technical leadership during modernization efforts, encompassing legacy system transformations, migrations to cloud-based platforms, cybersecurity updates, and digital accessibility enhancements across instructional and non-instructional systems.

⛳️ Requirements

• BA/BS degree and 12+ years of relevant experience OR an equivalent combination of education and experience.

• Master's degree is preferred.

• Proven experience supporting higher education institutions, ideally public universities or large multi-campus systems (e.g., CSU, UC, Big Ten, state university systems), in roles such as CTO, enterprise architect, CIO advisory, or senior solution architecture.

• Working knowledge of compliance and governance in higher education, including FERPA regulations, student data privacy, institutional data governance, and vendor risk management in academic settings.

• Experience working within decentralized IT frameworks, collaborating with campus IT teams, academic departments, and central governance bodies to align enterprise standards with local autonomy.

• Familiarity with accessibility and inclusive technology requirements in higher education, including Section 508, ADA, and CSU Accessible Technology Initiative (ATI) expectations for instructional and administrative systems.

• Demonstrated success in supporting public-sector procurement and RFP submissions within higher education, including requirements traceability, evaluation criteria mapping, and stakeholder presentations in formal selection processes.

• Ability to translate academic and institutional priorities into technology roadmaps, balancing student experience, faculty requirements, research facilitation, and administrative efficiency.

🏝️ Benefits

• Health insurance

• Flexible work arrangements

• Professional development opportunities