Lead Software Engineer - UK Hydrographic Office - G7

Location

Taunton

About the job

Job summary

As one of our Lead Software Engineers, you will be leading a delivery team of between 6-8 Software and Test Engineers.  You will have responsibility for leading the team supporting Critical Business Systems keeping the mariner safe at sea. This role, alongside the delivery manager and product owner, is key to the success of ensuring the systems are maintained, stable and secure.

The work we do really matters to the safety of lives at sea, climate change, environmental management and the ecology of the sea. 

As a lead you will be involved in technically leading an Application Support team that owns a number of business critical systems , the work will  include dealing with any live incidents, dealing with any security issues, continuous improvement work, and working with other teams/applications that interact with the teams services.

As one of the Lead Engineers, you will also be part of the Technical Leadership group of  Engineering, working with the Head of Engineering, helping shape policies and standards and driving the Engineering profession forward. 

We encourage and facilitate involvement in wider government, looking at how other Software Engineering depts work and what we can learn from them. 

On a personal development level, we have a well-developed framework, access to a whole range of certifications (e.g. we offer all the Microsoft certifications), as well as wider range of other technical and leadership development. 

Hybrid working

This job role can be worked on a hybrid basis, which is an informal, non-contractual and voluntary arrangement, working between the office in Taunton and remotely within the UK. 

The contractual location for the roles will be our office in Taunton, those individuals who live beyond a reasonable travelling distance from Taunton will be able to work from home unless required to attend the office for in-person events.  

For those individuals who live within a reasonable commuting distance of the office, how often individuals attend the office will be agreed on a case by case basis.

Please note there may be occasions when staff are required to travel into the office in Taunton for meetings, however this will be agreed on an individual basis. On these rare occasions the travel and any accommodation would need to be at their own expense.

Part-time hours of 30 hours might be considered for this role.  

Job description

• Provide technical leadership to an agile team designing and crafting software solutions, utilising methodologies such as unit testing and pair programming. The team will be focussed on developing and enhancing a set of core services, as well as building in resiliency and maintainability.  
• Coaching and mentoring the delivery team.
• Ensure effective use of automated testing and deployment tools to build and support a continuous delivery environment .
• Collaborate with others in the development community, identifying good practices we can adopt and sharing our experiences.
• Share knowledge of tools and techniques with the wider team.
• Continually develop your own skills as part of a programme of continuous professional development. 

Person specification

• A broad range of software engineering experience, including developing high-quality .NET applications.
• Experience with supporting, mentoring  and developing  software and test engineers, fostering an inclusive and collaborative team environment.
• Broad knowledge of design principles and patterns, able to lead the design of systems or components.
• A good knowledge of DevOps principles, for example Continuous Integration or Continuous Delivery.