Lead Developer

Purpose of the role

We help security leaders replace spreadsheets and fragmented tools with a unified platform for risk, compliance, incidents, suppliers, metrics, culture, and AI-enabled workflows. We are building our first engineering team in Kochi, and we are looking for a Founding Lead Developer to establish it, lead it, and grow it.

You will be the first developer in our Kochi team and its technical lead from day one. Working closely with the Head of AI and Engineering, you will start hands-on: building deep knowledge across the entire codebase and deployment pipeline, shipping roadmap features, and owning client requests and production issues. As the Kochi team grows, you will help hire, onboard, and lead the developers who join you, and establish the engineering standards the team works to.

This is a genuine founding role. Your leadership scope will grow with the team, with a clear path to Engineering Manager as the Kochi team scales.

As the company expands into the United States, the Kochi team will provide overnight turnaround for US clients, with issues raised during the US business day addressed while those clients sleep. You will help shape how this support model operates.

Core hours are 8:00 AM to 5:00 PM IST, overlapping with the Sydney afternoon, with a paid, rostered on-call arrangement for urgent US client issues

Major Accountabilities

Founding Team Leadership

• Act as technical lead for the Kochi team from day one, setting local engineering practices, tooling, and ways of working.
• Help hire and onboard future Kochi developers, including shaping roles, interviewing candidates, and conducting technical assessments.
• Lead and mentor developers as the team grows, reviewing their work and raising engineering standards.
• Build a strong working rhythm between Kochi and Sydney through clear written updates, demonstrations, and shared planning.

Platform Delivery & Ownership

• Build deep knowledge across the front end, back end, data, and deployment pipeline.
• Deliver roadmap features in collaboration with the Head of AI and Engineering and the Product team, from design through to tested release.
• Deploy, troubleshoot, and recover the platform independently, ensuring no critical component depends on a single person.
• Maintain runbooks and architecture documentation to ensure platform knowledge is shared across the team.

Client Requests & Issue Resolution

• Own the triage and resolution of client requests and bugs in accordance with agreed service levels.
• Identify the root causes of production issues and deliver tested fixes that prevent recurring defects.
• Deliver client-requested enhancements in collaboration with the Product team, keeping clients informed throughout the process.

US Expansion Support

• Provide overnight turnaround for US client issues, with rostered on-call coverage for urgent escalations.
• Support US client onboarding and the engineering work required for US hosting, data residency, and compliance.
• Feed recurring US client issues back to Product and Engineering to help shape the roadmap.

Engineering Quality & Secure Delivery

• Apply established engineering standards for code review, testing, and release management to every change.
• Embed secure coding practices across access control, secrets management, and third-party dependencies.
• Work within an agent-driven engineering model, reviewing and hardening AI-generated code.
• Follow client data-handling and access requirements, including restrictions on where client data can be accessed from.

Outcomes and Measures

• By day 60, independently deploy, troubleshoot, and roll back the platform.
• By day 90, ensure every critical platform component has runbooks and architecture documentation, with at least two people capable of supporting it.
• Resolve client requests and bugs within agreed service levels while reducing the backlog.
• Reduce recurring defects, production incidents, and rollbacks with each release.
• Provide US clients with overnight turnaround on reported issues and a consistent onboarding experience.
• As the team grows, ensure new Kochi developers become productive within 60 days and work to the same standards as the wider engineering team.

Professional Skills, Qualifications and Experience

• 7+ years of software development experience, including 2+ years as a technical lead on a production SaaS platform.
• Experience mentoring developers, ideally including hiring and building an engineering team.
• Strong hands-on skills in TypeScript/JavaScript, Angular front-end development, and back-end API development.
• Deep relational database experience with PostgreSQL or SQL Server, including performance tuning.
• Practical cloud experience with Azure or AWS, along with Git, CI/CD pipelines, Kubernetes, and Docker.
• Proven production support experience, including debugging complex issues in multi-tenant SaaS environments.
• Knowledge of secure coding practices, including the OWASP Top 10. Exposure to ISO 27001, NIST CSF, or SOC 2 is an advantage.
• AI-native developer who uses AI coding tools daily and rigorously reviews generated code.
• Excellent written and spoken English, with the confidence to work directly with Australian and US clients and colleagues.
• Degree in Software Engineering, Computer Science, Information Technology, or equivalent practical experience.

Personal Attributes & Interpersonal Skills

• Builder at heart: Comfortable creating structure and processes where none exist yet.
• Clear communicator: Proactively keeps the Sydney team informed of progress, risks, and blockers without being asked.
• Calm problem solver: Approaches complex issues methodically and remains composed when clients are waiting for a fix.
• Strong sense of ownership: Follows every issue through to resolution.
• Customer-minded: Treats each client request as an opportunity to build trust.
• Disciplined documenter: Shares knowledge freely rather than keeping it to themselves.
• Collaborative mentor: Helps improve the skills and performance of the developers around them.

How You Will Lead

• Set the standard: Model the engineering practices you expect from the team.
• Hire well: Raise the bar with every person who joins the Kochi team.
• Communicate early: Surface progress, risks, and blockers before anyone has to ask.
• Develop people: Provide clear feedback and help each developer grow.
• Own the outcome: Combine accountability, pace, and high standards.

Our Values

• Secure First: Security is at the forefront of our decision-making.
• Fail Fast: Try new approaches, but change course quickly when necessary.
• Customer-Driven: Listen to our customers and act on their feedback.
• Elegant Simplicity: Less is more.
• Stronger Together: We are individually brilliant, but even better together.

Health, Safety and Security Responsibilities

All employees are responsible for their own health, safety, and wellbeing, as well as that of their colleagues, and for protecting company and client information.

• Comply with applicable local workplace health and safety laws and company policies.
• Maintain a safe and ergonomic working environment, including when working from home.
• Follow company information security policies, including access control, acceptable use, and data handling.
• Report any hazards, injuries, or security incidents to your manager promptly.
• Complete pre-employment background screening and ongoing security awareness training.