Lead Software Engineer in Belfast

Main Purpose of the Role & Responsibilities

As a Lead Software Engineer in Kainos, you'll be responsible for leading teams and developing high quality solutions that delight customers and impact users worldwide. It’s a fast‑paced environment that requires sound, reasoned decisions. You’ll learn about new technologies and approaches with talented colleagues, manage, coach and develop a small number of staff, and focus on employee performance and career development. You’ll also provide direction and leadership for your team as you solve challenging problems together, interact with customers, share knowledge, and mentor those around you.

Minimum (Essential) Requirements

• Expertise in designing, building, testing and maintaining modern software applications, with strong experience in at least one of Python or C#/.NET
• Technical leadership of teams building and testing modern, scalable, secure, performant applications in line with software development principles, practices and patterns such as XP and TDD
• Experience building AI or ML‑powered products – including model integration, evaluation, prompt engineering or retrieval‑augmented generation pipelines
• Experience with Microsoft Azure AI services (e.g., Azure OpenAI Service, Microsoft Foundry, Cognitive Services) or equivalent cloud AI platforms
• Experience of technical ownership for a product or software project, including architecture, estimation, product planning and user story/requirement creation
• Expertise in software design and development across all layers of an application, including API design, data pipelines and front‑end integration
• Demonstrated ability to manage, coach and develop junior members of your team and the wider community
• Experience with the latest Continuous Integration and Continuous Delivery techniques, including CI/CD for ML/AI workloads (model versioning, experiment tracking, automated evaluation)

Desirable

• Experience with the Microsoft agent ecosystem – such as Microsoft Agent Framework, Copilot Studio, Microsoft 365 Agents SDK or Semantic Kernel
• Knowledge of responsible AI practices – including content filtering, PII handling, bias testing and governance of autonomous agent actions
• Good communication skills, with the ability to explain technical concepts and trade‑offs to both technical and non‑technical stakeholders
• Active participation in knowledge sharing activities, both within the team and at a wider capability level and externally where appropriate
• Experience in multiple programming languages and data storage technologies, including vector databases or search indices
• Knowledge of public cloud platforms such as Azure or AWS, including SaaS and PaaS offerings

Embracing our differences

At Kainos, we believe in the power of diversity, equity and inclusion. We are committed to building a team that is as diverse as the world we live in, where everyone is valued, respected, and given an equal chance to thrive. We actively seek out talented people from all backgrounds, regardless of age, race, ethnicity, gender, sexual orientation, religion, disability or any other characteristic that makes them who they are. We also believe every candidate deserves a level playing field. Our friendly talent acquisition team is here to support you every step of the way. If you require any accommodations or adjustments, we encourage you to reach out so we can tailor our recruitment process to your needs. We understand that everyone's journey is different, and by having a private conversation we can ensure that our recruitment process is tailored to your needs.