Lead Software Engineer (Growth)

Ophelos; Greater London; Hybrid; GBP 50,000 - 90,000; Full time

Job description

At Ophelos, we believe in a different way to deal with debt. One that puts empathy and understanding front and centre, approaching our customers as individuals — no matter what they’re going through.

For too long, people in debt have borne the brunt of poor industry practices. Intimidating tactics, time-consuming customer service and a one-size-fits-all approach that overlooks the reasons anyone can fall into debt in the first place. Meanwhile, businesses suffer too. Poor customer experience translates to poor customer satisfaction, high churn rates, bad brand reputation and ultimately missed opportunities.

That’s why we’re taking a radically different approach. Pioneering an industry-first AI-native collections platform, we build products that help individuals clear their debts in a way that suits them, whilst providing businesses with an improved customer experience and game-changing insights into their customer base.

Since our launch in 2021, we’ve worked with some of the UK’s leading companies, including Octopus, Scottish Power and Philips — helping millions of people move toward a more stable, debt-free future. In 2023, we were acquired by Intrum, Europe’s biggest credit management service and have begun the next phase in our growth — expansion into 17 European markets over the next two years.

The Role - Lead Software Engineer (Growth)

At Ophelos, we use cutting-edge AI and a customer-first approach to get people debt-free and organisations paid back. We are on an accelerated journey to roll out our products to 17 European countries.

Our Growth squad plays a critical role in this expansion. Building robust and scalable systems that empower clients and markets to self-onboard and enable us to support the financial health of millions of people.

We are looking for a Lead Software Engineer (Growth) with a passion for scale and innovation to join our team. Your mission will be to lead the team across various Growth projects, crucial to our expansion journey. It’s a small team of four, with ranging seniority so the majority of your time will be spent working as an individual contributor.

Our tech stack: Ruby on Rails 7, Hotwire (Turbo, Stimulus), View Components, Sidekiq, PostgreSQL, Redis, Serverless, AWS (Fargate, Aurora, ElastiCache), GitHub

In this role, you’ll get to:

• Lead the delivery of the product roadmap through organising the set up and orchestration of the squad’s technical roadmap and resourcing.
• Design, implement and deliver software such as ingestion pipelines, API and a greenfield internal operations application.
• Align technical solutions with business goals that enable us to meet our goals
• Prioritise and organise the team’s backlog; this refers to managing bugs, maintaining features and technical debt.
• Mentor other members of the team to ensure technical excellence and continuously raise the bar when it comes to engineering standards.
• Innovate by sharing your ideas with the team and build products that make an incredibly impactful difference to society and people’s lives

About you

More than anything, we are interested in your general experience as a software developer and your problem-solving approach. However, some experience in the following is important for this role:

• Experience with Backend language (ideally using a framework).
• Proven experience in managing technical teams and owning the delivery of a squad roadmap.
• Strong problem-solving skills to identify and address issues, blockers, and delays, with the ability to effectively communicate these to senior management.
• Pragmatic, business driven approach to developing technical solutions.
• Appreciation of clean architecture and design patterns and understanding of the benefits of test-driven code.

Nice to haves:

• Experience scaling a product over different geographies.

We are continually evolving our benefits package at Ophelos. We currently offer:

• Private healthcare through Vitality
• £200 Working from home allowance
• Cashback on costs of the dentist, opticians and more
• 25 days holiday
• Flexible Public Holidays (decide when to take time off)
• Free access to counselling sessions through our EAP
• Flexible Working arrangement - work from home or from the office
• Cycle to work scheme
• Company pension

At Ophelos, we are dedicated to ensuring that every candidate has an equal chance to succeed. If you need specific adjustments during the hiring process please let us know.

Here at Ophelos we are committed to pay transparency. That's why we share the salary range with every job posting.

About Our Team

Ophelos launched in June of 2021, backed by investors such as AlbionVC, Connect Ventures and Fly Ventures. In 2023, we were acquired by Intrum, Europe’s biggest credit management service. Our growing team has helped build some of the world’s most successful businesses, including the likes of Monzo, Google, Oracle, ASAPP, IBM and more — in addition to pioneering innovative products, sitting at the intersection of enterprise, financial technology, artificial intelligence and academia, working with institutions such as Oxford University, the University of Amsterdam and the University of Hong Kong.

Our Values

Supporting customers and businesses to improve their financial health is a long-term mission. Our company values act as our north star, steering our every move as an organisation and are the backbone of our unique company culture. Our values and culture allow us to stay true to our larger purpose, even as we continue to grow at a rapid pace.

Customers and Clients first – We exist to help real people move through debt and to get clients paid back. This commitment drives how we design products, deliver services, and interact with customers and clients daily.

Dream big – We have ambition and drive to succeed - we’re not just raising the bar, we’re confidently asserting ourselves as the benchmark.

Get it done – We’re decisive and embrace a sense of urgency; we don’t let opportunities get away from us. We’d rather act quickly and take informed risks, iterating and learning as we go.

Win as one - We work as one team, supporting each other and aiming for shared goals. At Ophelos, the team isn’t just individual departments - it’s all of us together. We challenge and support each other because we care about everyone’s growth and success.

Ophelos is committed to creating a diverse work environment and is proud to be an equal opportunity workplace, providing equal employment and advancement opportunities to all team members. We are building an environment where every Ophelos team member can thrive, feel a sense of belonging, and do the best work of their careers. We value diversity and recruit, hire, and promote individuals solely based on talent, qualifications, competence, and merit. We evaluate candidates without regard to race, colour, religion, age, sex, sexual orientation, gender identity, national origin, disability, or other protected characteristics as required by law and as a matter of our company values.