Software Engineering Lead (Hybrid)

Founded in 2006 and headquartered in Chicago, we are a technology solutions consultancy that partners with organisations from early-stage startups to the world's largest companies. We take on hard software challenges and turn them into durable results. Our commitment to quality means we deliver solutions we’re truly proud of, while our curiosity sparks innovation and breakthrough thinking.

You’ve shown long-term repeated success on a variety of projects, typically over the course of 7+ years. You can be the go-to leader for any software development engagement. You have a broad and deep range of expertise that allows you to make an immediate impact on projects.

• Built high-quality, maintainable software collaboratively, incrementally, and through an approach tailored towards the unique needs of the clients you’ve served.
• Written production-quality code using a variety of languages and frameworks, including but not limited to: Python, Java, JavaScript, TypeScript, React, Ruby, Scala, R, SQL, and Go.
• Leveraged AI-assistive development tools for tasks like scaffolding, refactoring, debugging, test generation, and documentation.
• Experience building or integrating AI/ML-powered features into products or systems (e.g., recommendation engines, NLP models, computer vision, predictive analytics).
• Used context-appropriate automated testing to inform software design choices and catch bugs.
• Collaborated with teams using Git, MacOS/Linux, and CI/CD.
• Remedied architecture-level concerns such as scalability, security, reliability, and performance.
• As a lead technologist on projects, you’ll work with a variety of clients, typically one to two in a year, through a variety of technologies and frameworks over the course of your career with us.
• You’ll lead more complicated projects, leading teams to do so, making immediate contributions to projects, rapidly building trust with clients.
• Working pragmatically to balance technology choices while delivering high-quality work within deadlines.
• Leading architecture and software design discussions.
• Collaborating on systems that involve the full ML lifecycle from data ingestion and preprocessing, to model deployment, integration, and performance monitoring.
• Managing high-level project roadmaps as the team lead for large engagements.
• Maintaining relationships with client technical leaders.
• Regular syncs with the client to provide status updates, and for identifying and evaluating risks and presenting potential solutions.
• Contributing to 8th Light by serving as a mentor, leading or designing workshops internally or for clients, representing 8th Light in the tech community, or supporting our hiring processes.

MLOps: including tools like LangChain for application development and managing the ML lifecycle.

Data Engineering: including platforms like Databricks for data processing and analytics.

DevSecOps & DevOps.

Building a truly diverse, equitable, and inclusive workplace is an ongoing journey, and we’re excited to keep learning and growing together. At 8th Light, we believe our people are our greatest asset. A robust L&D programme featuring unlimited access to thousands of books, courses, and expert-led training on the O'Reilly learning platform.

Annual financial stipend and time allotment for learning & development.

~ 12 weeks of new parent leave available for eligible employees.

A Note on Compensation: At 8th Light, we are committed to a compensation philosophy that is transparent, fair, and helps us attract and retain top talent in alignment with our company’s strategic growth goals and clients’ needs. We benchmark our salaries using Geographic Structures to establish competitive pay ranges within the regions where 8th Lights live.

8th Light Hubs and Geographies: We are a distributed team across the United States, Canada, and the United Kingdom, with hubs in Chicago, London, Los Angeles, New York, and Seattle. Employees working from our London hub follow a hybrid model, which includes a minimum of one day per week in our Waterloo Office. This co-working day is designed to encourage collaboration and further strengthen our community. In most cases, our consulting engagements do not require travel.