{"id":3411794,"url":"https://alion.io/job/openworks-engineering-software-engineering-team-lead","title":"Software Engineering Team Lead","company":{"id":679418,"name":"OpenWorks Engineering","domain":"openworksengineering.com","url":"https://alion.io/company/open-works-engineering","size_band":null,"is_staffing_agency":false,"employer_type":"direct","is_intermediary":false,"listed_via":null,"ats_vendor":"Workable","truth_index":null},"role":"Backend","role_family":"Backend","seniority":"lead","employment_type":null,"work_mode":"on_site","remote_scope":null,"remote_scope_basis":null,"remote_working_hours":null,"hiring_geo_confidence":"structured","locations":["Prudhoe, United Kingdom"],"countries":["GB"],"hiring_countries":[],"hiring_countries_total":0,"salary":{"min":70000,"max":null,"currency":"GBP","period":"year","gross":null,"usd_annual":93162},"salary_estimate":null,"experience_years_min":null,"visa_sponsorship":true,"relocation_package":false,"has_equity":false,"technologies":[{"name":"C++","optional":false},{"name":"Configuration Management","optional":false},{"name":"CMake","optional":true},{"name":"Linux","optional":true},{"name":"Python","optional":true},{"name":"TCP/IP","optional":true}],"status":"live","first_seen_at":"2026-10-28T18:10:27Z","employer_posted_date":"2026-10-28","last_verified_at":"2026-11-01T23:04:13Z","board_verified":true,"closed_at":null,"days_open":4,"trust":{"level":"ok","repost_count":null,"flags":[],"days_open":4},"description":"The Opportunity\nWe’re looking for a Lead Software Engineer who wants to stay close to complex engineering while helping a talented team achieve more. You’ll combine the technical challenge of developing advanced defence technology with the opportunity to grow people, ensuring that the day to day team output contributes to long-term goals.\nReporting to the Head of Software Engineering, you’ll help keep delivery on track, resolve day-to-day challenges and give engineers the confidence and space to take ownership of their work.\nThis role would suit a highly driven software engineer with strong people and organisational skills who enjoys developing others, bringing clarity to competing priorities and maintaining momentum in a growing business.\nWho We Are\nOpenWorks is a rapidly growing business operating globally with a passion for exceptional engineering and building on a legacy of defence innovation in the North East of England.\nOur products provide ultra-high performance, real-time detection, tracking, identification and targeting of dynamic aerial threats. They have been deployed internationally to protect high profile military and civilian assets, and contribute towards the defeat of nuisance, misguided and maliciously deployed drones during operations.\nWe are very proud to have supported a wide range of law enforcement and military operators, protecting many of the most high profile sites and individuals around the world.\nThe amazing things we do are only possible because of a dedicated and passionate team.\nSecurity Vetting Information\nOpenWorks Engineering operates within the defence sector. As part of our recruitment and onboarding processes, we collect information that may be required to support future security vetting and clearance requirements, should these become necessary during employment.\nWhy You’ll Love Working With Us\nJoin a high-energy, collaborative team where great ideas thrive, challenges are embraced, and people genuinely love what they do.\nHere’s what our benefits have to offer:\nRewarding Success - Competitive salary, starting from £70,000, plus a discretionary annual bonus of up to 25% of salary alongside a structured pay progression framework.\nEnhanced Pension - Up to 8% employer-matched contributions to help you plan for the future.\nMore Time to Recharge - 25 days’ holiday plus public holidays, long-service rewards, and the option to buy up to 5 extra days.\nBreakfast & Lunch on Us - Enjoy team breakfasts and freshly prepared lunches every day courtesy of Chef Mark and his team.\nHealth & Wellbeing - Private healthcare and life assurance for added peace of mind.\nSustainable Travel - Salary sacrifice schemes, including EV car and Cycle to Work options.\nTeam Socials - Regular events, from quiz nights and football to board games and more.\nLearning & Growth - A culture that empowers you to challenge, grow and make an impact, plus a £250 annual learning budget to invest in the development that matters most to you.\nWhat you’ll be doing:\nLead and develop the team: Line manage software engineers, holding regular one-to-ones, setting clear objectives and supporting individual development, progression and accountability.\nEnable performance: Provide timely feedback, address routine performance, behaviour, attendance and wellbeing matters, and involve the Head of Software Engineering and People team where appropriate.\nCoordinate day-to-day delivery: Turn priorities agreed with the Head into achievable plans, balancing workloads, capability, development needs and available capacity. Keep progress, blockers and delivery risks visible.\nEmpower engineers to deliver: Help the team maintain focus, make sound decisions and follow through on commitments. Encourage ownership, constructive challenge and direct access to colleagues with the right expertise.\nContribute to the engineering: Provide practical technical guidance, support design and code reviews, and contribute to development and problem-solving where needed, while maintaining focus on your people leadership responsibilities.\nPut standards into practice: Work with the Head and Principal Software Engineers to embed agreed approaches to code review, source control, testing, release, documentation and configuration management.\nKeep teams connected: Coordinate dependencies with Project Management and colleagues across Hardware & Systems, Intelligence & Autonomy, Product, Production Engineering, Operations and Customer Support. Resolve routine issues and involve the Head or Principals when wider decisions are needed.\nStrengthen the team as we grow: Support recruitment, interviewing, onboarding and probation reviews. Give the Head a clear view of team capability, morale, workload and skills gaps, and improve delivery without unnecessary process.\nWhat we’re looking for:\nEssential\nRelevant qualification: A Bachelor’s degree or equivalent in Computer Science, Software Engineering, Engineering, Physics or a related technical discipline.\nPeople leadership: Experience leading team members, with responsibility for driving performance and project delivery - underpinned with exceptional communication and team building skills.\nC++ and embedded experience: A software engineering background, including strong C++ development experience.\nDesign and Architecture: Experience developing software deployed on real-time embedded platforms, including architecture design, hardware and OS specification, code development and review, source control and release management. \nFull lifecycle delivery: Experience across software development, code review, source control, testing and software release management.\nTechnical judgement and communication: The credibility to guide and challenge experienced engineers, make effective decisions and collaborate across technical and non-technical teams, while giving others ownership of detailed delivery.\nOrganisation and adaptability: Confidence working in a fast-paced environment where priorities can change, with the resilience and organisation to balance workloads and maintain delivery focus.\nDesirable\nRelevant product technologies: Experience in electro-optical, autonomous systems, radar, surveillance or counter-UAS technologies.\nLinux and development tools: Experience with Linux hardware drivers, network configuration, TCP/IP, CMake and DevOps practices.\nAdditional technical skills: Experience with Python, cyber security and/or video streaming technologies.\nRegulated engineering: Experience in highly regulated, safety-critical or quality-focused engineering environments.\nDefence standards: Knowledge of relevant defence engineering standards and compliance requirements.\nFurther qualifications: A Master’s qualification in a relevant Computer Science, Software Engineering or Engineering field.\nProfessional recognition: Chartered Engineer status or equivalent recognition through a relevant professional institution.\nApplicants must have the right to work in the UK. We are unable to offer visa sponsorship.\nMore about us:\nVision\nHelp protect the territory and airspace of NATO countries and their allies.\nMission\nBe a world-leading provider of autonomous technology for Surveillance applications and Defence\nValues\nBe a Good Egg: Earn respect, have mutual trust and be honest\nDo cool stuff: We develop cool tech with an awesome team, and we get stuff done\nBe empowered: We are autonomous, reliable and take personal responsibility\nWe are one team: Look out for each other and the team\nThings go wrong: Fail fast, learn and move on\nHave fun: We’re doing amazing things with passionate people\nWe Get It Done: Focus on what matters and work with energy to bring ideas to life","description_format":"text","description_chars":7661,"description_truncated":false,"requirements":{"experience_years_min":null,"management_years_min":null,"team_size_min":null,"manages_managers":false,"education":null,"security_clearance":false,"languages":[]},"benefits":[],"hiring_locations":[{"name":"United Kingdom","iso":"GB","kind":"country"}],"hiring_excludes":[],"relocation_offered":false,"industries":["Air Defense","Machine Vision & 3D Cameras"],"lifecycle":[{"event":"open","at":"2026-10-28T18:10:27Z"}],"visa":[],"liveness":{"score":90,"band":"hot","label":"Hiring now","p_open":1,"p_active":0.903,"p_room":1,"age_days":3,"expected_fill_days":22,"reasons":["conf:2","velocity","win:early"],"computed_at":"2026-11-01T06:10:25Z"},"pay":{"stated_usd_annual":93162,"is_top_pay":false},"html_url":"https://alion.io/job/openworks-engineering-software-engineering-team-lead","json_url":"https://alion.io/job/openworks-engineering-software-engineering-team-lead.json","meta":{"generated_at":"2026-11-02T00:19:18Z","cache_seconds":300,"methodology":"https://alion.io/methodology","terms":"https://alion.io/terms","contact":"https://alion.io/contact","api":"https://alion.io/developers","about":"Alion is a live layer of people, companies and AI agents: who they are, whether they are real and active right now, what they do and how to work with them, readable by people and by agents and paid per call.","catalog":"https://alion.io/catalog.json","usage":{"tier":"crawler_verified","counted_by":"address","units_charged":1,"used_today":450,"day_limit":null,"remaining_today":null,"minute_limit":300,"resets_at":"2026-11-03T00:00:00Z"}},"offers":[{"id":"company.slices","title":"One company in depth, by slice","status":"live","price":{"credits":0.02,"usd":0.002,"plus_per_slice":{"credits":0.05,"usd":0.005}},"unit":"per company, plus each slice with data","note":"the employer in depth","call":{"mcp_tool":"get_company","arguments":{"id":679418},"rest":"https://alion.io/mcp/rest/get_company?id=679418"},"human":"https://alion.io/catalog?offer=company.slices&for=job%2Fopenworks-engineering-software-engineering-team-lead"},{"id":"market.stats","title":"A market slice: pay, demand and time to fill","status":"live","price":{"credits":1,"usd":0.1},"unit":"per slice","note":"pay, demand and time to fill for this role and place","call":{"mcp_tool":"market_stats"},"human":"https://alion.io/catalog?offer=market.stats&for=job%2Fopenworks-engineering-software-engineering-team-lead"},{"id":"job.search","title":"Open jobs by role, technology, place, pay and visa","status":"live","price":{"credits":0.02,"usd":0.002},"unit":"per posting in a list","note":"similar open postings","call":{"mcp_tool":"search_jobs"},"human":"https://alion.io/catalog?offer=job.search&for=job%2Fopenworks-engineering-software-engineering-team-lead"},{"id":"company.verify","title":"Is this company real and active right now","status":"pilot","price":null,"unit":"per company","request":{"url":"https://alion.io/catalog/request","method":"POST","body":"{\"offer\": \"company.verify\", \"for\": \"job/openworks-engineering-software-engineering-team-lead\", \"note\": \"what you need it for\"}"},"human":"https://alion.io/catalog?offer=company.verify&for=job%2Fopenworks-engineering-software-engineering-team-lead"}],"agent":{"mcp":"https://alion.io/mcp/jobs","mcp_open":"https://alion.io/mcp/open","next":[{"tool":"get_job","arguments":{"id":3411794}},{"tool":"search_jobs","arguments":{"company":"openworksengineering.com","detail":"compact"}},{"tool":"match_people","arguments":{"job_id":3411794},"note":"people open to offers who fit this vacancy"}],"note":"The same data through MCP tools: https://alion.io/mcp/open needs no sign-in (compact searches, postings, people); https://alion.io/mcp with an Alion account has everything. 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