Senior Software Engineer

Nando's UK & IRE; Greater London; On-site; GBP 60,000 - 80,000; Full time

Job summary

A leading restaurant chain is seeking a Senior Software Engineer specializing in UI to enhance their design system. The ideal candidate will be proficient in React and TypeScript, skilled in developing maintainable UI components, and passionate about mentoring. You'll work closely with designers and engineers to realize a unified brand experience across digital platforms. This role offers a unique opportunity to drive the technical direction in a small, valued team focused on quality and innovation.

Qualifications

• Strong proficiency with React and TypeScript is required.
• Expert-level proficiency in writing scalable CSS with a focus on architecture.
• Experience with testing strategies, including visual regression and unit testing.

Responsibilities

• Co-architect the technical direction of the design system.
• Develop high-quality, maintainable UI components and tooling.
• Mentor and coach engineers in best practices.

Skills

React

TypeScript

CSS architecture

HTML semantics

Accessibility

Web performance

Mentoring

Modern frontend tooling

Tools

Next.js

Storybook

Vite

Cloud Build

GitHub Actions

Terraform

Job description

Senior Software Engineer - UI Specialist

About the Role

We are seeking a Senior Software Engineer with a strong UI specialisation to join our Design System Team. Our design system powers almost every web application across Nando's - from customer-facing digital experiences to internal workflow tools and restaurant operations systems. We're a small, specialist team that's highly valued across the organisation, with strong support from engineering and design leadership.

With your expertise in frontend technologies and passion for design principles, you will play a key role in enabling our vision: to create a unified brand experience for customers across all digital touchpoints.

What You'll Do

• Co-architect and drive the technical direction of our design system alongside the technical lead
• Contribute to the maintenance, evolution, and advocacy of our digital design system
• Develop high-quality, scalable, and maintainable UI components and tooling that meet accessibility, performance and design standards
• Collaborate closely with designers to provide feedback and help realise our shared vision for UI & UX
• Support agile cross-functional teams as they adopt and adapt the system using modern web technologies and frameworks
• Mentor and coach engineers in modern web technologies and development best practices to help foster a culture of collaboration and innovation
• Actively participate in code reviews, testing, and deployment processes to ensure high-quality software development practices
• Take a proactive approach to identifying opportunities and driving improvements across the system

What We're Looking For

• Strong proficiency with React and TypeScript: You are comfortable architecting complex component systems
• Expert-level proficiency in writing scalable, maintainable CSS - you have a deep understanding of CSS architecture, specificity, cascade, and layout systems, with a keen eye for detail
• Extensive experience with modern frontend tooling such as Next.js, Storybook, and Vite
• Strong foundations in client-side engineering best practices, including HTML semantics, accessibility, and web performance
• Experience with testing strategies, including visual regression testing, unit testing and accessibility audits
• A passion for mentoring engineers and providing constructive feedback to improve code quality and team performance
• Strong communication skills - able to articulate technical decisions, present architectural options clearly, and build relationships across engineering and design teams

Nice to Have

• A proven record of contributing to design systems or UI libraries at scale
• A solid understanding of zero-runtime CSS-in-JS solutions and atomic styling methodologies, advanced styling solutions such as vanilla-extract or CSS Modules
• Experience working with design tokens and styling portability across platforms
• Interest in emerging AI-assisted development tools - we're investigating how these can support our work, whilst maintaining our focus on quality and craftsmanship
• Practical knowledge of accessibility testing and tools to ensure we meet WCAG guidelines and provide a great user experience for everyone
• Experience working with modern CI/CD and engineering tooling - we use Cloud Build, GitHub Actions and Terraform

You Are

• Proactive and self-directed - you thrive in a small, dedicated specialist function and don't need constant direction
• Kind and empathetic, encouraging others to do their best work and building a psychologically-safe, happy workplace
• People-focused with a genuine interest in mentoring and supporting engineers
• A great communicator who can tailor conversations to your audience at all levels of the business
• Passionate about client-side web development and staying up to date with the latest technologies and trends
• Experienced in building and deploying web applications with a focus on scalability, maintainability and user experience
• Someone who enjoys close collaboration with designers and takes pride in realising design vision through code