Software Development Team Leader

We are hiring a Software Development Team Lead to take technical and people leadership of our engineering team. This is a hybrid role combining hands-on engineering (you will still ship code), people leadership (1:1s, growth, hiring), and delivery accountability (releases, quality, customer commitments).

You will own the technical health of the Valuechain platform (Django, Django REST Framework, React) and partner closely with Product, Customer Success, and the COO to make sure we ship the right features at the right quality.

Key Responsibilities

Technical leadership

• Own architecture, code quality, and engineering standards across the Valuechain platform (Django/DRF backend, React frontend, multi-role auth)
• Lead technical design for new modules and major features (supplier onboarding, procurement workflows, RFQ, orderbook, performance, analytics)
• Drive best practice around code review, automated testing, CI/CD, security, observability, and performance
• Resolve complex technical issues across backend, frontend, and database layers (including SQL Server and PostgreSQL workloads)
• Manage technical debt alongside new feature delivery

People leadership

• Line manage full stack engineers, growth plans, and performance reviews
• Coach and mentor the team on technical depth, delivery practice, and customer focus
• Lead hiring for engineering roles, including interview design, screening, and onboarding
• Build a culture of ownership, accountability, and continuous improvement

Delivery

• Partner with Product and Customer Success to plan and prioritise the engineering roadmap
• Run sprint planning, estimation, and release management
• Track delivery risks and communicate progress clearly to leadership and customers
• Hit customer-committed go-live dates (we are currently running multi-customer release programmes)

Customer engagement

• Engage directly with enterprise customers on technical questions, requirements, integrations, and escalations
• Support pre-sales activity for strategic opportunities (technical scoping, demos, RFP responses)

Do you have experience in Software development?, * 7+ years of professional software engineering experience

• 2+ years leading or managing a software development team
• Strong production experience with Python, Django, and Django REST Framework
• Strong production experience with React and modern JavaScript or TypeScript
• Solid relational database skills (PostgreSQL or SQL Server preferred), including query optimisation
• Experience designing and shipping RESTful APIs, authentication, and multi-tenant or multi-role architectures
• Cloud experience (AWS or Azure)
• Demonstrable track record of shipping production software to enterprise customers
• Strong code review and mentoring skills
• Excellent written and verbal communication, able to translate technical concepts for non-technical stakeholders
• Experience integrating with ERP systems (such as SAP, Microsoft Dynamics, Sage, Infor, Epicor)

Desirable

• Experience with SaaS platforms serving enterprise B2B customers
• Background in supply chain, procurement, manufacturing, or industrial software
• DevOps experience (containerisation, CI/CD pipelines, infrastructure as code)
• Familiarity with analytics, BI tooling, or data warehousing
• Experience embedding AI features (search, classification, generative assistants) into production products

Pulled from the full job description

• On-site gym
• Casual dress
• Work from home
• On-site parking, * Casual dress
• On-site gym
• On-site parking
• Work from home

Valuechain is a supply chain SaaS platform helping UK and international manufacturers digitise supplier onboarding, procurement, RFQ, orderbook, performance tracking, and analytics. We serve a portfolio of established OEM and Tier 1 manufacturing customers, with new enterprise accounts onboarded continuously as the platform scales.