Tech Lead / Staff Software Engineer

Job brief

Being a Tech Lead is probably 20% communication, 20% problem-solving, and 20% coaching/people/process. Is that how you operate? We're looking for collaborative, cross-functional, product-oriented problem-solvers (ie. 'full-stack and more') to help us create dignified access to financial opportunities in Africa and beyond, by helping businesses to trust their customers and partners. 

Akiba is a seed-stage startup in Identity/RegTech, seemingly right at the moment where we achieve Product-Market Fit. We just joined the Global RegTech 100! If we're right, we are about to start growing fast and building a LOT of great software. We've just launched the MVP of our Risk-Decisioning Platform 'AkibaOne', which combines Application Processing, Data-Sourcing, Identity-Verification, Risk-Scoring, and Low-Code Workflows and Decisioning. We've got a lot of work to do to go from MVP to v1, and then we add new products. 

Our stack is mostly Python and Javascript on Kubernetes: a web app with a Django backend and an API platform driven mostly by Node and some Python, with customer-facing API's managed by Fusio. We're transitioning to Continuous Delivery under the new CTO because the best way to help engineers build great software is to deliver and test it quickly, not a month later.

Our team is global and fully-distributed: as long as you can be online with us for 5-6 hours a day, and as long as you speak English with advanced fluency (because: communication), we don't care where you are. We get together for retreats someplace beautiful whenever we can. And if you'd like to join our Hybrid office setup in Johannesburg, you're very welcome.

Responsibilities

• Architect and develop for our existing systems and new ones
• Collaborate hands-on with Product every single day to define products that add value for customers, and to help the CTO plan iterative agile delivery (Product and Tech are a single, integrated team here)
• Lead collaborative code-reviews that guide and empower your team of engineers/developers, without bike-shedding on the small stuff or demanding total control
• Help your people to optimize their processes and mental-models for rapid learning and blameless problem-solving
• Design and code both front- and back-end in a clean and modular way
• Deploy scalable, reliable and operable services to the cloud, teaching the team to ensure observability and monitoring as first-class concerns
• 'Shift-Left' on security and operability, building them in from the start
• Develop and publish internal and external APIs that other developers love to use, and architect our interactions with dozens of downstream data-providers
• Guide the team toward test-driven development, starting with unit and API testing and collaborating with the QE who does our functional automation
• Help develop minimum-viable documentation to explain and share your solutions with the team, and help them to write (mostly) self-documenting code
• Help the CTO to create a great environment for our people, where they can learn and grow and develop the confidence that maybe they can be like you some day

Requirements

• Curiosity, Kindness, Persistence, and an Analytical Mind
• Minimum 3-5 years of experience in software engineering
• Demonstrated experience leading and organizing others, even if it wasn't reflected in your title; and the desire to lead through example, not coercion
• Deep hands-on experience with Javascript for UI (React) and either Python or Javascript (or Ruby - it's close enough) on the back-end
• Experience with relational (e.g. MySQL, PostgreSQL) and NoSQL databases (e.g. MongoDB)
• Evidence of continuous growth and learning, with proof of having effectively and quickly adopted new technologies, because in reality: nobody already knows it all
• Product-orientation, more than a little HTML & CSS, and knowledge of the basic rules of creating effective human interfaces
• Hands-on experience shaping an agile team process (no certifications or strong dogma required), and ability to explain why/when it's helpful
• Passionate commitment to CI/CD and experience with effective enabling tools
• Basic operating familiarity with cloud infrastructure (some K8s chops would be great too, but not expected) 
• Use AI in your own work and have an opinion about how your team should use it
• Preferably: experience in a fast-moving, startup-style environment at least once (we do NOT operate like a big enterprise)
• Nice-to-have: Bachelors degree in Software Engineering, Information Technology or related field, but we're big fans of self-taught engineers

Compensation and Benefits

If you're looking to build a product that matters with a team that makes you want to show up each morning, that's Akiba. But full-disclosure: we're a seed-stage startup, which means that if you're looking for the highest-possible compensation, we're not (yet) the right place. Compensation is very likely to increase if we land Series A funding in approx. 9 months (or get profitable fast), but we don't have guarantees.

In the meantime, tell us what comp you would need in order to join us, and we'll do our best. We also provide a documented Employee Stock-Option Plan, paid vacation/holidays, and all the tools you'd need (computer, etc.) to do good work.

Also: we have a team of leaders from local and global businesses for you to learn from. Our team comes from McKinsey, Transunion, and other great organizations. And your CTO is a hands-on Engineer who knows his first job is to set you up for success and to communicate what you need to the rest of the company, not to look over your shoulder while you code. ;-)