Staff / Principal Software Engineer, Ministry of Education

GovTech Singapore; Singapore; On-site; SGD 180,000 - 260,000; Full time

Benefits offered by this job

Flexible work arrangements

Employee wellness programs

Total rewards

Inclusive workplace

Job summary

GovTech Singapore invites applications for a Staff/Principal Software Engineer to lead MOE engineering platform teams and drive scalable software delivery. You will set technical direction, shape a coherent developer experience, and build platform tools with security-by-default and observability.

Join a mission-driven public sector team, enjoy flexible work arrangements where role permits, and contribute to building modern, cloud-native systems across multiple product domains.

Qualifications

• Bachelor’s or Master’s degree in Computer Science, Engineering, or related field.
• 8+ years of software engineering experience, including leadership roles.
• Proven ability to lead teams delivering large-scale platforms.
• Strong programming in Node.js, Go, or Python and frontend experience with React or Vue.
• Experience with cloud-native architectures (AWS/Azure) and microservices.
• Familiar with Docker and CI/CD tooling.
• Excellent written and verbal communication and stakeholder management.

Responsibilities

• Champion engineering investment. Define strategy and build the first high-leverage platform bet.
• Shape a coherent developer experience across platform teams.
• Ship platforms with tooling, CI/CD, observability, and security-by-default as products.
• Set technical direction and standards to enable fast yet coherent delivery.
• Lead through delivery across autonomous teams and influence through work, not authority.

Skills

Engineering leadership

Node.js

Go

Python

React

Vue

AWS/Azure

Kubernetes

Docker

CI/CD

Architectural design

Stakeholder management

Education

Bachelor’s or Master’s degree in Computer Science, Engineering, or related field

Tools

AWS/Azure

Kubernetes

Docker

CI/CD tooling

Job description

GovTech is the lead agency driving Singapore’s Smart Nation initiatives and public sector digital transformation. As the Centre of Excellence for Infocomm Technology and Smart Systems (ICT & SS), GovTech develops the Singapore Government’s capabilities in Data Science & Artificial Intelligence, Application Development, Smart City Technology, Digital Infrastructure, and Cybersecurity.

At GovTech, we offer you a purposeful career to make lives better where we empower our people to master their craft through robust learning and development opportunities all year round.

Play a part in Singapore’s vision to build a Smart Nation and embark on your meaningful journey to build tech for public good. Join us to advance our mission and shape your future with us today!

Learn more about GovTech at tech.gov.sg.

What you will be working on

We're hiring a Staff/Principal Software Engineer to lead the next shift in how MOE's engineering teams build and ship software. MOE is moving up the next level of engineering maturity. We have multiple product teams and platform teams supporting the Ministry’s Product domains - Students, Teachers, Parents, HQ and more. The next bound of digital ambitions involve the delivery of value by value-stream teams that work directly with users, accelerated by platform teams that offload complexity and enable consistency at scale.

What You'll Possibly Work On

• Champion engineering investment. Identify where platform work will most accelerate business delivery. Make the case, define the strategy, and build the first high-leverage bet that proves it.
• Shape a coherent developer experience. See across multiple platform teams and define what a joined-up engineering journey looks like — from onboarding to deployment to observability.
• Ship platforms that make product teams faster. Developer tooling, CI/CD, service templates, observability, security-by-default — built as products with clear interfaces and self-service workflows.
• Set technical direction and standards. Define the architecture, patterns, and conventions that let teams move fast independently while staying coherent. Encode standards in tooling — make the right thing the easy thing.
• Lead through delivery and trust. Work across autonomous teams. Your influence comes from shipping things engineers love, not from positional authority.

Key Indicators of Success

• You've built platform-level solutions (service frameworks, developer tooling, shared infrastructure) that were adopted by multiple teams — not because you mandated it, but because it was better.
• You've reduced systemic complexity at an organisation. You can point to something that used to be hard for every team and is now easy because of work you did.
• You make independent architectural decisions for systems that other engineers depend on. You're comfortable with that responsibility.
• You've grown other engineers — through design reviews, technical standards, pairing, or mentorship. The teams around you are better because you're there.
• You communicate in writing. ADRs, design docs, technical strategy — you write clearly enough that people can act on your thinking without a meeting.
• You have strong opinions about how software should be built, held looselyenough to change when the evidence says so.

Strong Signals

• You've worked in platform engineering, developer experience, or infrastructure-as-product — and you think of engineers as your users.
• You've defined practices for development (review standards, quality gates, acceptable use) at a team or org level.
• You've led modernisation at organisational scale.

What we are looking for

• Bachelor’s or Master’s degree in Computer Science, Engineering, or related field (or equivalent experience).
• 8+ years of software engineering experience, including 3–5 years in engineering leadership roles.
• Proven ability to lead teams, delivering large-scale, high-impact systems or platforms.
• Solid foundation in modern programming languages (e.g., Node.js, Go, Python) and frontend frameworks (e.g., React, Vue).
• Experience with cloud-native architectures (AWS/Azure) and microservices.
• Familiarity with containerization (Docker) and CI/CD tool
• Skilled at setting technical direction, driving engineering standards, and balancing delivery with quality.
• Excellent communication and stakeholder management skills, with the ability to influence at all levels.
• Committed to fostering a culture of inclusion, learning, and technical excellence.

Overall we look for people who have ability, initiative, good communication, and strong values

What we offer you:

GovTech is an equal opportunity employer committed to fostering an inclusive workplace that values diverse voices and perspectives, as we believe that diversity is the foundation to innovation.

Our employee benefits are based on a total rewards approach, offering a holistic and market-competitive suite of perks. These include leave benefits to meet your work-life needs and employee wellness programs.

We champion flexible work arrangements (subject to your job role) and trust that you will manage your own time to deliver your best, wherever you are, and whatever works best for you.

Learn more about life inside GovTech at go.gov.sg/GovTechCareers.

Stay connected with us on social media at go.gov.sg/ConnectWithGovTech