Lead Software Engineer

Role: Lead Software Engineer
Location: Milton Keynes (Hybrid – Once a Month On-Site)
Salary: £60,000 – £67,000
Network IT are partnering with a large, service‑focused organisation undergoing significant modernisation across its digital and engineering landscape. We’re seeking an experienced Lead Engineer to drive technical excellence, shape modern engineering practices, and provide end‑to‑end leadership across complex software and systems delivery.
This role is ideal for a proven technical leader who enjoys balancing architecture, hands‑on engineering, mentoring, and driving continuous improvement. You’ll help define the technical roadmap, uplift engineering standards, and support the delivery of secure, scalable, and high‑performing applications across cloud and on‑prem environments.
Role Overview & Responsibilities
As a Lead Engineer, you’ll take technical ownership of products and platforms, leading multidisciplinary engineering teams to deliver robust, secure, and scalable solutions.
Key responsibilities include:

• Leading day‑to‑day performance, motivation, and objectives for engineering teams.
• Mentoring and developing engineers, supporting skills growth and professional development.
• Driving engineering best practice across DevOps, agile delivery, tooling, automation, testing, and CI/CD.
• Designing and architecting complex systems, ensuring scalable, cost‑effective, and maintainable solutions.
• Owning local architecture decisions, collaborating closely with solution architects and product leads.
• Overseeing full lifecycle delivery including design, development, integration, configuration, and testing.
• Leading data modelling and database design in partnership with data architects.
• Managing supplier relationships and contributing to effective resource allocation.
• Promoting DevOps culture, automation, observability, and practical application of AI where beneficial.
• Supporting continuous improvement and the uplift of engineering standards across the wider organisation.

Essential Skills & Experience
To succeed in this role, you will bring:

• Expertise in systems architecture, distributed systems, microservices, cloud platforms (AWS/Azure), and API‑led design.
• Proven background in software engineering, including coding, debugging, reviews, and modern development practices.
• Strong technical leadership experience across software and systems engineering.
• Excellent people management and mentoring skills, including the ability to communicate technical concepts clearly to non‑technical stakeholders.
• Deep understanding of testing approaches including TDD, automated testing, and non‑functional testing.
• Experience with CI/CD pipelines, DevOps practices, infrastructure‑as‑code, and automation.
• Strong data and database design skills.
• Familiarity with modern digital architectures (e.g., MACH – Microservices, API‑first, Cloud‑native, Headless).