Senior Software Engineer

In brief

**Overview** This role is for a Senior Software Engineer (SSE) within Sanlam Fintech x, a small business unit operating within the larger Sanlam Group office. The Senior Software Engineer acts as a technical leader, tasked with demonstrating excellence in designing complex solutions and influencing the team through mentorship and technical guidance. This position requires the ability to lead significant development efforts, drive best practices, and translate business needs into scalable technical solutions. SSEs will collaborate closely with stakeholders to shape product direction, proactively manage technical debt, and elevate team capabilities. The role reports to a Tech Lead and demands deep technical expertise, strong leadership, and the ability to align technical decisions with business objectives. **What you will do** * Lead significant development efforts, drive best practices, and translate business needs into scalable technical solutions. * Work closely with stakeholders to shape product direction. * Proactively manage technical debt and elevate team capabilities. * Work closely with Product Management and Design teams to understand business needs and shape solutions. * Collaborate with architects and technical leadership on architectural decisions. * Drive operational excellence through robust system design and team mentorship. * Design and implement high-quality, scalable solutions for complex technical challenges. * Lead development efforts for significant features or components within the team. * Design robust, scalable components and services with consideration for failure modes. * Make significant contributions to architecture discussions and technical decision-making within the team. * Review and guide the team's system designs, ensuring alignment with broader architecture. * Drive best practices in coding standards, testing methodologies, and operational excellence. * Establish team-level code quality practices and drive regular refactoring initiatives. * Consider ROI and business impact when making technical decisions. * Work closely with stakeholders to understand business needs and translate them into technical solutions. * Collaborate effectively with Product Management and Design to shape solutions and improve product functionality. * Communicate technical concepts effectively to both technical and non-technical stakeholders within the team. * Align technical solutions with business objectives and consider business implications of technical investments. * Understand business context deeply and how technical decisions impact business outcomes. * Proactively identify and address technical debt within area of responsibility. * Develop strategies for managing team technical debt in systematic, sustainable ways. * Design systems with reliability in mind, including comprehensive monitoring and alerting strategies. * Take ownership of production incidents related to their area, ensuring proper resolution and follow-up. * Lead incident investigations and conduct thorough postmortems to prevent recurrence. * Apply systematic approaches to debugging and resolve complex technical issues. * Provide technical mentorship to team members and actively help grow their capabilities. * Influence the entire team through technical leadership, coaching, and guidance. * Facilitate team decisions and help resolve technical disagreements constructively. * Mentor team members on both technical skills and soft skills development. * Provide regular constructive feedback through code reviews and one-on-one interactions. * Help less experienced engineers develop problem-solving approaches and technical judgement. * Design systems with comprehensive monitoring, logging, and alerting capabilities. * Lead the team's approach to incident response and drive improvements in operational processes. * Ensure the team maintains high standards for code quality, testing, and system reliability. * Champion automation and reduction of operational toil within the team. **Requirements (from the original advert)** **Qualification and Experience** * Relevant degree or diploma in Computer Science, IT, or related field or equivalent practical experience. * Typically 8+ years of software engineering experience. * Strong knowledge of multiple programming languages, best practices and performance characteristics. * Experienced with several frameworks and capable of contributing improvements and custom extensions. * Extensive experience designing, developing, and testing distributed, high-volume and highly reliable software. * Experience with cloud-based infrastructure and operational practices. **What will make you successful in this role?** * Solution Design Capability: Proven ability to design robust, scalable solutions for complex problems whilst considering trade-offs, failure modes, and long-term maintainability. Makes sound architectural decisions for team-owned components. * Technical Leadership: Demonstrated ability to influence the team through technical excellence, mentorship, and guidance. Drives best practices and elevates team capabilities through coaching and example. * Business Acumen: Deep understanding of how technical solutions support business objectives. Considers ROI of technical investments and aligns technical work with business goals. Understands product strategy and market context. * Communication Excellence: Strong communication skills to translate technical concepts for non-technical stakeholders, facilitate team discussions, and influence decision-making. Creates clear technical documentation. * Problem-solving Excellence: Applies systematic approaches to debugging and resolving complex issues. Identifies root causes and develops comprehensive solutions that address underlying problems, not just symptoms. **Required Behavioural Competencies (SFTx's 6 Leadership Principles)** * Ownership Mindset: Looking for ways to do, instead of reasons not to. Being accountable for actions and decisions, owning both successes and mistakes, and learning and growing from each experience. * Growth Mindset: Always learning and improving, getting better each time. Embracing challenges and failures as opportunities for growth. * Customer Centricity: A deep understanding of the customer seen in everything you do. Being led by customers, their feedback and their behaviours. * Innovation Jugaad: Where some see impossible, seeing a way. Doing more with less, applying creativity to turn obstacles into opportunities, chance into change. * Velocity: Moving fast and fixing things. Working iteratively to deliver customer value without sacrificing long-term value for short-term results. * Inclusion: Seeking out and valuing different perspectives. Believing that when we change how we look at things, how things look for us also changes, making tomorrow not just different, but better. **Who should apply** This role is ideal for an experienced software engineer with a strong background (typically 8+ years) who excels as a technical leader and mentor. The successful candidate will possess deep technical expertise in designing and implementing complex, scalable, and reliable software, particularly in distributed, high-volume, and cloud-based environments. They should be adept at translating business needs into technical solutions, collaborating effectively with diverse stakeholders, and driving architectural and operational excellence. Beyond technical prowess, the ideal applicant will demonstrate strong leadership by influencing and developing team members, have a keen business acumen, and exhibit excellent communication skills to convey complex ideas to various audiences. Crucially, they should embody Sanlam Fintech x's 6 Leadership Principles, including an ownership mindset, a commitment to continuous growth, customer centricity, an innovative approach to problem-solving, a bias for velocity, and a dedication to inclusion. **Deadline** Not specified **Reference** Original posting: https://www.myjobmag.co.za/job/senior-software-engineer-sanlam-5 Source: myjobmag

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• At least 8 years of experience.

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