{"id":3966022,"url":"https://alion.io/job/sanlam-senior-software-engineer-3","title":"Senior Software Engineer","company":{"id":2194082,"name":"Sanlam","domain":"sanlam.com","url":"https://alion.io/company/sanlam-co-za","size_band":"1001-5000","is_staffing_agency":false,"employer_type":"direct","is_intermediary":false,"listed_via":null,"ats_vendor":"SuccessFactors","truth_index":null},"role":"Backend","role_family":"Backend","seniority":"senior","employment_type":null,"work_mode":"on_site","remote_scope":null,"remote_scope_basis":null,"remote_working_hours":null,"hiring_geo_confidence":"structured","locations":["South Africa"],"countries":["ZA"],"hiring_countries":[],"hiring_countries_total":0,"salary":null,"salary_estimate":null,"experience_years_min":8,"visa_sponsorship":false,"relocation_package":false,"has_equity":true,"technologies":[{"name":"AI Agents","optional":false},{"name":"CI/CD","optional":false}],"status":"live","first_seen_at":"2026-11-09T14:14:47Z","employer_posted_date":"2026-11-09","last_verified_at":"2026-11-09T20:14:27Z","board_verified":true,"closed_at":null,"days_open":0,"trust":{"level":"ok","repost_count":null,"flags":[],"days_open":0},"description":"Who are we?\nSanlam Life and Savings (SLS) is one of Sanlam’s core business clusters, bringing together life insurance, retirement, savings and investment capabilities to help clients build and protect their financial futures.\nSLS Technology is at the heart of this ambition. We are modernising our technology landscape, strengthening our engineering capability and building product-aligned teams that take end-to-end accountability for the technology they create, from design and build through to running, enhancing and continuously improving it.\nJob Description\nSLS Technology is looking for an exceptional Senior Software Engineer to join our Life Annuities Technology team. This is a senior, hands-on engineering role for someone who thrives on solving complex technical problems, designing scalable systems and setting a high engineering standard for others. Working closely with the Tech Lead, Product Management and Design, you will help shape technical solutions and turn business and customer needs into secure, reliable and maintainable technology.\nOur philosophy is simple: Build it. Own it. You will take meaningful ownership across the full technology lifecycle, from solution design and software development through testing, deployment, production support, enhancement and continuous improvement. You will remain close to the code while also providing technical guidance and mentorship to other engineers, helping us build both an outstanding product and a high-performing engineering team.\nWhat will you do?\nSoftware Engineering & Solution Design\nDesign, build, test and maintain high-quality, scalable software, writing clean, well-tested and maintainable production code.\nLead the engineering of complex features, services and components.\nTranslate complex requirements into pragmatic and maintainable technical solutions.\nContribute meaningfully to architecture, system design and technology decisions, designing for scalability, security, resilience, performance and failure.\nSet and champion engineering standards across coding, testing, documentation and code reviews.\nUse modern AI-assisted and agentic engineering practices to accelerate software design, development, testing, debugging, documentation and continuous improvement.\nDesign and build AI-enabled or agentic capabilities where appropriate, applying sound engineering principles around security, testing, observability, human oversight and reliability.\nOwn what we build\nTake end-to-end ownership of the technology you create, including its performance in production.\nProactively identify and address technical debt.\nBuild monitoring, logging, alerting and observability into solutions.\nDiagnose and resolve complex production issues.\nLead root-cause analysis and contribute to blameless post-incident reviews.\nContinuously improve system reliability, performance and maintainability.\nTechnical Leadership & Mentorship\nBe a trusted technical voice within the engineering team.\nMentor junior and mid-level engineers through pairing, code reviews and hands-on coaching.\nHelp engineers strengthen their technical judgement and problem-solving capability.\nFacilitate technical discussions and constructively challenge engineering decisions.\nShare knowledge and contribute to a culture of technical excellence and continuous learning.\nProduct & Business Collaboration\nWork closely with the Tech Lead, Product Management, Design, Architecture and business stakeholders.\nUnderstand the customer and business problem, not just the technical requirement.\nBalance delivery speed with sustainability, technical quality and long-term product health.\nCommunicate technical decisions and trade-offs clearly to technical and non-technical audiences.\nWhat you will bring\nRelevant degree or diploma in Computer Science, Information Technology, Engineering or a related field, or equivalent practical experience.\nTypically 8+ years of software engineering experience, with deep hands-on experience designing, developing and operating complex software systems.\nStrong proficiency across relevant modern programming languages and frameworks.\nStrong understanding of software design principles, engineering patterns, security and performance.\nExperience designing distributed, high-volume and highly reliable systems.\nStrong understanding of APIs, integration patterns and modern application architecture.\nExperience with relational and/or NoSQL databases.\nExperience with cloud-based infrastructure and modern operational practices, including CI/CD, automated testing, observability and DevOps engineering.\nPractical experience with, or strong exposure to, AI-assisted software development and coding agents, and an understanding of how generative AI is changing modern software engineering.\nProven ability to mentor and technically influence other engineers.\nWhat will make you successful?\nEngineering Excellence: You care deeply about your craft and leave code and systems better than you found them.\nTechnical Judgement: You understand trade-offs and know when to optimise for speed, simplicity, scale or resilience.\nOwnership: Production is part of engineering. If we build it, we own it.\nProblem Solving: You enjoy getting underneath complex problems and addressing root causes rather than symptoms.\nProduct Thinking: You understand that excellent engineering ultimately needs to create customer and business value.\nMentorship: You make other engineers better through coaching, collaboration and example.\nContinuous Learning: You remain curious and actively explore better engineering approaches, technologies and tools.\nWhy join SLS Technology?\nThis is an opportunity to:\nBuild a strategically important financial services product from the ground up.\nShape the technical foundation rather than inherit all the decisions.\nHelp select and develop the engineering team that will build and operate the product.\nWork with meaningful autonomy and end-to-end accountability.\nSolve complex technology problems in a large, regulated financial services environment.\nBuild technology that supports customers at an important stage of their financial lives.\nContribute to the evolution of modern product and engineering practices across SLS Technology.\nGrow your career within one of Africa’s largest diversified financial services groups.\nThe opportunity\nWe are looking for more than someone who can coordinate delivery. We need a technology leader who can design it, build it, lead it and own it.\nIf you are excited by the opportunity to create a strong engineering team, build enduring technology and take responsibility for the product throughout its lifecycle, we would like to hear from you.\nTurnaround time\nThe shortlisting process will only start once the application due date has been reached. The time taken tocomplete this process will depend on how far you progress and the availability of managers.\nClosing date 30 November 2026.\nThe Sanlam Group is committed to achieving transformation and embraces diversity. This commitment is what drives us to achieve a diverse, inclusive and equitable workplace as we believe that these are key components to ensuring a thriving and sustainable business in South Africa. 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