Principal Software Developer - Tech Lead

Department/Location: University Information Services

The University of Cambridge's Information Services is looking for a hands-on Tech Lead to lead and manage a team of engineers working on building new cloud native services and modernising existing applications within a Division of 40 engineers. The services that the Division maintains, of which some are public facing, are mainly used by University staff, researchers, and students which total around 60,000 people. Your work will have a significant impact on the reputation of one of the world's leading universities. 

Our newer services use modern web architecture standards, are structured around APIs and are continuously built and tested using GitLab. They run on Docker containers and are deployed to a serverless container platform or a Kubernetes cluster on Google Cloud. 

Our technology stack is Terraform, Ansible, GitLab, Python, Django, React and Typescript. We have produced boilerplate solutions and turn-key templates to be more efficient, work better at scale and keep themselves DRY. The team has a DevOps culture, uses Scrum for its day to day work, and has adopted an "open by default" approach to new work. 

Examples of our projects can be found at https://gitlab.developers.cam.ac.uk/uis/devops and our publicly-available guidebook is available at https://guidebook.devops.uis.cam.ac.uk/.

Our ideal candidate will be highly skilled in modern Software Development tools and practices, and always keep themselves up to date. 

Be an expert in: 

• Architecting web applications, including API design, with a focus on maintainability, stability and security, using clean code.
• Packaging web applications in Docker containers.
• GitLab
• Creating CI pipelines for building and testing web applications. 

Have a working knowledge of: 

• Best practices in deploying containerized web applications to the cloud.
• Testing frameworks and testing best practices. 

and will: 

• Be able to work across multiple product and service teams to help build consistent and unified application architectures.
• Drive improvements in technical architecture, standards and processes.
• Manage, train, and mentor a team of engineers.
• Work with leadership on new initiatives.
• Have excellent written and verbal communication skills.
• Have a strong Software Engineering background with a passion for DevOps
• Focus on delivery while taking a continuous improvement approach to existing services.
• Work closely with other University members to gather, clarify, and break down requirements.
• Enjoy working with a large variety of services and technologies. 

We welcome applications from individuals who wish to be considered for flexible working arrangements.

We particularly welcome applications from women for this vacancy as they are currently under-represented at this level in our department.

To apply online for this vacancy and to view further information about the role, please click on the apply button above.

Please quote reference VC44038 on your application and in any correspondence about this vacancy.

The University actively supports equality, diversity and inclusion and encourages applications from all sections of society.

The University has a responsibility to ensure that all employees are eligible to live and work in the UK.

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