Software Development Lead

Software Development Lead Location: Canberra, Australia Salary: AUD $170,000 – $180,000 + 12% Superannuation. Employment Type: Full-time About the Opportunity CR3 Recruitment are currently representing a global education technology business that develops software and digital solutions designed to create safer, more effective and engaging learning environments. The organisation provides technology used by education and corporate customers internationally, with a portfolio spanning digital safety, monitoring, wellbeing and infrastructure solutions. As the business continues to grow and develop its technology offering, they are looking for an experienced Software Development Lead to join their engineering function in Canberra. This is a hands-on leadership position, combining software development, technical leadership and people management. You will lead a small team of developers and QA professionals while remaining technically involved in the development and delivery of key products. The Role As Software Development Lead, you will take ownership of the development and ongoing support of a key area of the company's product portfolio. You will provide technical direction to the development team, help shape what gets built alongside Product, and ensure solutions are delivered to a high standard across architecture, security, quality, scalability and performance. The role will suit someone who enjoys being close to the technology but is also ready to take responsibility for a team and wider delivery. Key Responsibilities Technical Leadership Lead the development and delivery of a key part of the product portfolio.Remain hands-on with software development and technical problem solving.Participate in technical and architectural design discussions.Establish and maintain strong development standards, coding practices and architectural principles.Provide technical guidance, mentoring and support to developers.Ensure solutions meet appropriate security, compliance and architectural standards.Identify opportunities to modernise and improve existing technology.Team Leadership & People Management Lead, coach and develop a small team of software developers, engineers and technical specialists.Support performance reviews, goal setting and individual development plans.Build a collaborative, supportive and high-performing engineering culture.Assist with recruitment, onboarding and retention of technical talent.Delivery & Project Management Work closely with Product and business stakeholders to understand requirements and translate them into effective technical solutions.Help prioritise development work and manage competing priorities.Oversee the full software development lifecycle from design through to release and ongoing support.Ensure development projects are delivered on time and to the required quality standards.Identify and manage technical risks, dependencies and delivery challenges.Stakeholder Management Build strong relationships with technical and non-technical stakeholders.Act as a key link between engineering, Product and wider business teams.Clearly communicate technical recommendations, project progress, risks and challenges.Work with Product to help influence and shape future development priorities.Quality, Security & DevOps Maintain strong software quality and testing processes.Ensure appropriate code reviews, automated testing and release processes are followed.Promote modern DevOps practices and CI/CD.Ensure applications follow secure development and data protection principles.Contribute to technical governance, risk management and audit requirements.Application Support & Continuous Improvement Ensure applications remain reliable, performant and supportable.Manage technical debt and identify opportunities for continuous improvement.Support incident resolution and root cause analysis.Contribute to business continuity and disaster recovery planning. What We're Looking For We are looking for an experienced software engineer or development lead who has progressed into a technical leadership position and is comfortable balancing hands-on development with team leadership and delivery responsibility. You will ideally have: Experience leading software development teams and managing the full software development lifecycle.Strong experience across both application/business logic and UI development.Experience managing workloads, resources and software delivery.Strong knowledge of DevOps principles and CI/CD.Excellent communication and stakeholder management skills.A good understanding of application security and secure development practices.Experience establishing technical standards and development best practices.Experience writing and maintaining automated tests. Technical Skills Essential: Strong Java development experience within enterprise environments.Experience with modern Java frameworks and technologies.Strong knowledge of Spring, particularly Spring Boot and Spring MVC.Experience working with microservices architectures.Strong database experience, including SQL and Hibernate/JPA.Experience with JavaScript and React, with enough front-end knowledge to review work and help unblock developers.Experience with CI/CD and development tooling such as Jenkins, Git, Bitbucket, Jira or Azure DevOps.Desirable: Experience with cloud platforms such as AWS and/or Microsoft Azure.Experience with automated testing frameworks such as JUnit, Spock or EasyMock.Experience developing and integrating RESTful APIs and web services.Experience with Docker and Kubernetes or similar containerisation/orchestration technologies. Working Arrangements As the business operates across multiple international locations, there will be an expectation that you are flexible with your working hours to accommodate two or three early-evening sessions per week, allowing for collaboration and overlap with global teams. Salary & Benefits AUD $170,000 – $180,000 + 12% Superannuation.Full-time position based in CanberraOpportunity to lead a small, talented engineering team.Hands-on technical leadership role with genuine influence over product development.Opportunity to work within a growing international technology business.Exposure to modern software development, cloud, DevOps and SaaS technologies.Collaborative and international working environment.