Software Development Lead

About the role

This is a hands-on leadership role, not a management one. You will still be in the code, and you will also be the person who decides how a system is shaped, what gets built first, and when to tell a client that the thing they asked for is not the thing they need. You will be accountable for delivery on client engagements: the architecture, the estimate, the sequence and the handover. Our standard is that another engineer could take over what we built without us, and holding that line is a large part of this job. The contract runs three years. You will be living with your own architectural decisions long enough to learn from them, which is the only way anyone actually gets better at this.

What you will do

• Own the architecture and technical direction of client systems, and write the decisions down
• Lead a small team of engineers: sequencing work, reviewing code, and raising the standard rather than policing it
• Stay hands-on. Roughly half this role is still writing production code
• Design cloud architecture across AWS and Azure, including cost, security and operational reality
• Run the delivery conversation with clients directly, including the awkward parts about scope and timelines
• Give honest estimates, and flag slippage early rather than at the deadline
• Set and hold the quality bar: testing, pipelines, documentation, and handover that actually works

What we are looking for

• Around 12 years in software engineering, with several of those leading technical delivery
• Deep Java and Spring Boot, with system design judgement you can explain to a non-technical client
• Strong cloud architecture on AWS or Azure: networking, identity, managed data services, observability and cost control
• Proven ownership of a system end to end, from design through production support
• Experience leading and mentoring engineers, including giving difficult feedback well
• Comfortable talking to clients, including saying no and explaining why
• South African work authorisation, and able to work hybrid from Johannesburg

Nice to have

• Kubernetes and container orchestration at production scale
• Terraform or equivalent infrastructure as code
• Event-driven architecture with Kafka or similar
• Experience across more than one backend stack, for example Python, Node.js, .NET or Go
• Cloud architecture certification such as AZ-305 or AWS Solutions Architect Professional
• Consulting or client-facing delivery background
• Having inherited a system nobody understood and made it maintainable

We do not advertise a salary. Tell us what you are looking for when you apply and we will be straight with you about whether it is in range.

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