Lead Backend Architect - Python/Kotlin on AWS (Hybrid)

Motion Recruitment; Waltham (MA); Hybrid; USD 173,000 - 234,000; Full time

Benefits offered by this job

Medical Insurance

Dental Benefits

Vision Benefits

Paid Time Off (PTO)

401(k) Life Insurance

Disability Insurance

Parental Leave

Job summary

Motion Recruitment Partners LLC in Waltham, MA is seeking a Lead Backend Software Engineer to guide a high-performance team while hands-on coding in Python and Kotlin. You will shape backend systems, cloud-native infrastructure, and drive AI-powered development in a fast-paced environment with frequent production deployments.

You will mentor engineers, design scalable services on AWS, and partner with product and platform leaders to define technical roadmaps, delivering reliable, observable

Qualifications

• 10+ years of backend software engineering experience.
• 2+ years leading software engineering teams.
• Expert-level proficiency with Python and modern backend development practices.
• Professional experience with Kotlin in production environments.
• Strong AWS cloud platform experience, including designing and operating distributed systems.
• Experience building and supporting highly available, scalable microservices architectures.
• Hands-on engineering leader who actively contributes production code.
• Experience working in fast-paced environments with frequent production deployments.
• Knowledge of CI/CD pipelines, infrastructure automation, and cloud-native engineering.
• Strong understanding of software design, system architecture, observability, and performance optimization.
• Experience mentoring engineers and driving technical excellence across teams.
• Bachelor's degree in Computer Science, Engineering, or equivalent practical experience.

Responsibilities

• Lead a team of backend engineers while remaining an active contributor to the codebase.
• Design, build, and scale cloud-native backend services using Python and Kotlin.
• Architect and optimize AWS-based distributed systems.
• Drive delivery of production-ready software in an environment where code is released continuously throughout the day.
• Champion engineering best practices including testing, observability, reliability, and operational excellence.
• Mentor and develop engineers through technical guidance, code reviews, and career coaching.
• Partner with product, platform, and engineering leaders to define technical roadmaps.
• Implement AI-driven capabilities and automate software development lifecycle processes.
• Improve developer productivity through enhanced tooling, automation, and platform capabilities.
• Ensure system reliability, scalability, security, and performance across all services.

Skills

Python

Kotlin

AWS

Microservices

CI/CD

Observability

Mentoring

Leadership

Architecting systems

Deployment automation

Education

Bachelor's degree in Computer Science, Engineering, or equivalent

Tools

Kubernetes

Terraform

Maven/Gradle

CloudFormation

Job description

Motion Recruitment Partners LLC in Waltham, MA is seeking a Lead Backend Software Engineer to guide a high-performance team while hands-on coding in Python and Kotlin. You will shape backend systems, cloud-native infrastructure, and drive AI-powered development in a fast-paced environment with frequent production deployments.

You will mentor engineers, design scalable services on AWS, and partner with product and platform leaders to define technical roadmaps, delivering reliable, observable