Principal Full Stack Engineer at Infected Blood Authority, Newcastle/Remote, £Contract Rate

The Infected Blood Compensation Authority (IBCA) is a new arm’s-length body which is being set up, at unprecedented pace, to administer compensation to people whose lives have been impacted by the infected blood scandal

A rare opportunity to lead cutting-edge software engineering across the breadth of a public service making a real difference. Joining IBCA early in the service lifecycle allows for the Principal Software Developer to influence tech decisions, build capability, and implement best in class engineering standards.

As the Principal Software Engineer, you will be an experienced voice in the organisation, leading and coaching colleagues to design and develop applications that meet the user needs, and comply with government technology and design standards. You will be responsible for the development of frontend and backend services, applying a rigorous testing approach to ensure applications are functionally sound, secure, performant, and maintainable. You will design code to operate in different host environments, with the ability to effectively debug production issues.

You will need to collaborate effectively in a fast-paced, agile environment with other technical and non-technical stakeholders, and proactively input technical detail to architectural designs and business analysis.

We are looking for an engineering leader across the breadth of the software development lifecycle, from analysing technical requirements, to developing high quality applications and supporting them in production. By owning and championing engineering standards and best practices, you will ensure quality outcomes and reduce technical debt.

Experience

• You will be adept at software engineering disciplines and proficient in a range of programming languages (TypeScript, Python), frameworks (NextJS), techniques (TDD, containerisation), data services (PostgreSQL, message queues), and tools (git, GitHub Actions).
• Proven experience implementing applications as part of complex, multi-component services running within AWS infrastructure.
• Proven experience working with relational and non-relational databases, and handling sensitive data.
• Experience building and running containerised applications as part of a Kubernetes cluster (EKS).
• Responsible for developing engineering standards and best practices, and help teams to adopt efficient ways of working.
• Articulate technical options that meet user and business needs, and set technical direction.
• Collaborate with user centred designers and architects to translate technical designs into working end-to-end services.
• Ensure applications are compliant with appropriate standards including functional and non-functional requirements.
• Work closely with DevOps colleagues to iterate continuous build pipelines that deliver releases frequently and reliably.
• Lead the evaluation of tooling and solutions to aid constant improvements, ensuring products are built in the right way.
• Proactively share knowledge, solutions and support our internal communities along with mentoring, coaching, and supporting engineers.
• Demonstrable skills in modern development languages and practices, and have an aptitude to learn more.
• Deep understanding of software design patterns and applying them effectively to produce testable solutions that can adapt to changing needs.