iwoca - Backend Tech Lead
Requirements
• Experience developing and owning shared backend services that other engineering teams contribute to and depend on - being the trusted reviewer for their contributions and shaping how they build on top of your work. • Experience building and shaping distributed systems in complex business domains. • Advanced proficiency in software development. • Confidence to work closely with partners from other disciplines to challenge assumptions and discover underlying problems. • Demonstrable leadership skills: you have mentored juniors and inspired teams to deliver cross-functional projects. You can balance hands-on coding with strategic planning. • You use AI (like Cursor, Claude Code or similar) in your daily flow—whether for work or for fun. You use it to blast through boilerplate and research, so you can focus on the hard parts: complex architecture, rigour, and high-stakes decision-making. • A strong numerical or technical background, ideally with a degree in physics, engineering, maths, computer science or a related field. • Experience with Python, Django, or PostgreSQL. • Familiarity with data analytics or machine learning processes. • Experience with complex data architectures, including event-sourced data models.
Responsibilities
• Section 3 of 3: You and AI • At iwoca, we expect AI to become central to how analytical and technical work gets done. We’re looking for AI native engineers who use the latest tools to turn great ideas into living products. • Which of these have you experimented with or integrated into your workflow? • Whether it’s for your day job or a weekend project, tell us what’s in your toolkit. Select all that apply. • Models in CLI (e.g. Claude Code, Aider, Cline, or similar) • AI-Native IDEs (e.g. Cursor, Windsurf, PearAI, or similar) • Spec-driven development (SDD): Using AI to turn high level specs into working code (e.g. using tools like Kiro, Spec-kit, Tessl Framework or similar) • Advanced Context & Knowledge Graphs (e.g. Cognee, MCP servers, RAG-based codebase indexing) • Locally hosted AI (e.g. Ollama, LM Studio, or similar) • AI Reliability & Maintenance (e.g. building evals, observability, or guardrails for your AI workflows) • None of the above • Is the tool you had in mind not mentioned above? Note it here • Tell us a story about an AI-driven workflow you’ve built that you’re proud of. • Professional or personal – both count. We’d love to hear what the bottleneck or challenge was, what you used or built, and what happened. • Diversity Survey (Optional) • This survey helps us evaluate our diversity and inclusion efforts. It's voluntary and optional. And, refusal to submit the survey will not affect your job application. • Survey answers are not seen on an individual basis. This submission will only be used to help us with our commitment to continuously improve our diversity and inclusivity best practices. • Either way, thank you for reading. • What is your current age? • I prefer not to answer • What is your gender identity? • Another Gender Identity • Which of the following communities do you belong to? Please select all that apply. • Person with disability • Refugee or immigrant • None of the above • What is your racial or ethnic identity? • Our data retention policy. • When you apply for a job at iwoca we will retain your personal data (includes your CV, email correspondence, interview notes and application test scores) for a period of time so that, in the event of a legal claim, we can demonstrate that we did not discriminate against applicants on prohibited grounds and that we conducted the recruitment process in a fair and transparent manner. • For candidates applying to our vacancies in the UK: • If you are unsuccessful with your application we will keep hold of your data for 6 months. For more information on this, please see our UK candidate privacy notice. • For candidates applying to our vacancies in Germany: • If you are unsuccessful with your application we will keep hold of your data for 6 months. After this period, we will securely destroy your personal data in accordance with our DE Data Retention Policy. • Optional : Consent to extended retention period: • If you are happy to give us consent to do so, we would like to keep your data for up to 24 months so we can contact you should any future opportunities arise. Please tick the corresponding consent box below if you would like us to retain your data for that extended period. You can withdraw your consent at any time by contacting us via the details below. • Help or queries: • If you have any questions about our privacy policies or the protection of your data please contact our data protection officers by email at [email protected] (UK) or [email protected] (Germany) • Note: The consent period lasts for 2 years • Recruiting Privacy Policy • Submit Application
Benefits
• Backend Tech Lead - Funnel Platform • Hybrid in London (UK) or Remote within the UK • We’re hiring a Tech Lead for our Funnel Platform Team. • You will lead the evolution of the shared code, frameworks, and integrations that power our services, build and improve business-critical systems, and shape the technical vision. Your customers are other iwoca engineers. • The company • Small businesses move fast. Opportunities often don’t wait, and cash flow pressures can appear overnight. To keep going, and growing, SMEs need finance that’s as flexible and responsive as they are. • That's why we built iwoca. Our smart technology, data science and five-star customer service ensures business owners can act with the speed, confidence and control they need, exactly when it's needed. • We’ve already cleared the way for 100,000 businesses with more than £4 billion in funding. Our passionate team is driven to help even more SMEs succeed, through access to better finance and other services that make running a business easier. Our ultimate mission is to support one million SMEs in their defining moments, creating lasting impact for the communities and economies they drive. • The Team • The Platform team owns approximately 10 shared services that the rest of iwoca engineering builds on top of - including the frameworks and integrations with external data providers (Experian, Equifax, TransUnion, Companies House etc) that underpin our credit decisions. This is not an SRE or DevOps team. Funnel Platform is code and framework focused - building and stewarding the shared services that the rest of engineering depends on. • The team works hand-in-hand with other teams to build and deliver a shared vision for the future of the platform. • We expect to pay from £90,000 - £120,000 for this role. But, we’re open-minded, so definitely include your salary goals with your application. We routinely benchmark salaries against market rates, and run quarterly performance and salary reviews. • The culture • At iwoca, the best idea wins. We model our culture on independent thinking, challenging untested logic, and evidence-based decisions. We prioritise learning and growth, and give people the autonomy to develop in the direction that makes them most effective. • We're a tech company and believe in the power of AI to help us work faster and better. We provide the infrastructure where every iwocan always has access to the best models and where those models have access to all of our data. We will help our people to learn how to use and grow with the new tools available to them. • We put a lot of effort into making iwoca a great place to work: • Offices in London, Leeds, Berlin, and Frankfurt with plenty of drinks and snacks. • Events and community-led groups, including running groups, padel, and monthly ping-pong and pool competitions. • Flexible working hours. • Medical insurance from Vitality, including discounted gym membership. • A private GP service (separate from Vitality) for you, your partner, and your dependents. • 25 days’ holiday per year, an extra day off for your birthday, the option to buy or sell an additional five days of annual leave, and unlimited unpaid leave. • A one-month, fully paid sabbatical after four years. • Instant access to external counselling and therapy sessions for team members that need emotional or mental health support. • 3% Pension contributions on total earnings. • An employee equity incentive scheme. • Generous parental leave and a nursery tax benefit scheme to help you save money. • Electric car scheme and cycle to work scheme. • Two company retreats a year: we’ve been to France, Italy, Spain, and further afield. • And to make sure we all keep learning, we offer: • A learning and development budget for everyone. • Company-wide talks with internal and external speakers. • Access to learning platforms like Treehouse. • Interview welcome pack
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