Sr Lead Software Engineer(Python/AWS/SQL)

lseg; Bengaluru; On-site; INR 3,000,000 - 5,200,000; Full time

Job summary

FTSE Russell is seeking a Lead Software Engineer in Bengaluru to own architectural direction while remaining hands-on. You will write production code and mentor peers, shaping scalable data-intensive systems and services used to power financial indices globally.

In this role you will drive cross-language excellence, with focus on Python and strong background in either Java, C#, C++, Scala, Go, or Rust. Expect ownership of delivery, security, and observability across the platform.

Qualifications

• Substantial track record building and shipping software in production
• Must be hands-on with production Python; depth in other languages acceptable
• Strong software design and architecture experience
• Excellent code quality through reviews, testing, and clean design
• Mentors engineers and drives technical direction across a defined area
• Owns technical outcomes and understands data-intensive systems

Responsibilities

• Designing and writing production code, primarily in Python, with 10+ years of experience
• Owning technical direction and architecture for a defined platform area
• Leading design of services, APIs, libraries, and interfaces with resilience and performance
• Raising engineering quality through reviews, shared components, and testing practices
• Mentoring engineers and growing capability across the team
• Managing design trade-offs, security, and operational readiness
• Designing data-intensive software across relational databases and AWS services
• Building scalable data processing on AWS with Lambda, containers, and lakehouse formats
• Embedding observability and quality controls and communicating across teams
• Deepening knowledge of financial indices domain to guide design

Skills

Python

Java

C#

C

C++

Scala

Go

Rust

Code design

Mentoring

Hands-on engineering

Tools

AWS

Aurora PostgreSQL

Lambda

Glue

EMR Serverless

Iceberg

CI/CD

pytest

Job description

ROLE SUMMARY

Are you a hands-on engineer who raises the bar for everyone around you? Join us at FTSE Russell! We're establishing a team of engineers passionate about software craftsmanship, quality, and substantial impact. As a Lead Software Engineer, you'll own the technical direction of the software that powers the indices trusted by financial institutions worldwide. We build primarily in Python, so that's our preference - but depth of engineering judgement matters more to us than the language on your CV. If you've led the design and delivery of serious systems in Java, C#, C, C++, Scala, Go, or Rust and you're motivated to lead in Python, we'd like to talk. At this level we expect you to become fluent quickly and to bring the cross-language perspective with you. This is a hands-on Lead IC role - not a management role. You'll still be writing and reviewing code every week. What changes at this level is scope: you own architecture and technical direction in a defined area, you mentor and grow the engineers around you, and you raise quality across the team through reuse, good design, and hands-on support. The systems handle serious volumes of financial data, so there's real depth in the data problems - but you're being hired as a software engineer who leads through code. If you're excited about building systems that matter and making the engineers around you better, we'd love to meet you.

WHAT YOU'LL BE DOING

• Staying hands-on - designing and writing production code, primarily in Python with 10 +yrs of experience , and setting the standard for what good looks like through the code you ship
• Owning technical direction and architecture for a defined area of the platform, and making the trade-offs explicit so the team can move fast with confidence
• Leading design of software systems - services, APIs, shared libraries, and the interfaces between them - with resilience, performance, and reusability designed in
• Driving engineering quality across the team: raising the bar in code review, reducing duplication through well-designed shared components, and championing testing, refactoring, and secure development practices
• Mentoring and coaching engineers - pairing, reviewing, and growing capability so that good practice outlives any one project
• Digging into design and risk trade-offs - failure modes, operational readiness, security, and cost - and resolving the blockers that slow the team down
• Designing data-intensive software across relational databases (Aurora PostgreSQL), object storage, and AWS services, with careful attention to schema design and evolution at scale
• Building software that processes data at scale on AWS - Lambda, containerised services, and where appropriate Glue, EMR Serverless, and lakehouse table formats such as Apache Iceberg
• Embedding observability and quality controls so issues are found before customers find them
• Influencing and collaborating across teams, and translating between technical and non-technical audiences
• Building deep knowledge of the financial indices domain and using it to guide team-level design

WHAT YOU'LL BRING

• A substantial track record of building and shipping software. Applications, services, platforms, or libraries you designed, built, ran in production, and evolved over years - not just pipelines and scripts
• Python is our preference, but not a hard gate at this level either. Either you already lead in production Python, or you have equivalent depth in Java, C#, C, C++, Scala, Go, or Rust and are motivated to make Python your primary language here. Engineers who have worked across several languages often bring the sharpest design judgement, and we value that
• Depth in software design and architecture - you can decompose a complex problem, choose the right boundaries, and explain why. You know which patterns earn their keep and which are cargo cult
• You write and review excellent code. In Python: type hints, linters, strong pytest discipline, and an instinct for readable, maintainable code - and the equivalent rigour in any other language you've worked in
• You are genuinely hands-on and intend to stay that way. Leading through code is the point of this role
• Proven experience mentoring and levelling up other engineers - through code review, pairing, design guidance, and setting standards
• Strong ownership of technical outcomes - you take responsibility for what production does, not just what merges
• Deep experience with relational databases (e.g. Aurora PostgreSQL) - modelling, performance, and evolution under real load
• Solid AWS experience and strong CI/CD, automation, and testing practice
• Comfort with data-intensive systems - batch processing, ETL, schema evolution, and reasoning about correctness at volume
• Excellent communication - you tailor how you explain design decisions to technical