Senior Software Engineer

Hi we’re Genio. We create beautifully simple learning tools that boost knowledge, skills, and confidence.

• We’re a SaaS scale up and one of the fastest growing tech companies in the North. 

• There’s 100+ of us around the UK with our HQ in Leeds. 

• Our software is award-winning and used by 100,000s of students at over 800 universities & colleges worldwide. 

• We’re growing so we can achieve our mission to support 1 million students to become better learners by 2030. 

About the role

As a Senior Engineer, your role will involve driving the design and implementation of software, solving complex technical challenges, mentoring junior engineers and collaborating within and outside of your squad to ensure the development of scalable, high quality solutions in alignment with Genio’s goals and Engineering Principles.

Meet the team: 

Technology at Genio is a cross-functional function made of Engineering, Product, Product Marketing, User Experience, Customer Experience and Data.  This filters down to our product squads where we have at least one team member from each discipline working together to build the best product for our users and customers.  

You’ll be joining one of four stream-aligned squads; Buyer Admin & Distribute(internally known as BEAR), Buyer HE solution (known internally as Loch HESS), Note-taking (known internally as GOAT), Learning (known internally as Egg).

You’ll work closely with the whole Engineering team. You’ll be managed by one of the Engineering Line Managers; Natasha (owns a dog called Bailey), Charlene (owns a sausage dog called Spud), or Mark (Nomad policy champion, Genio Pride organiser).

Heading up the line managers is Mala, Head of Engineering. 

What you’ll be doing: 

• Software development, test and deployment support 

  • Design, develop and maintain robust, scalable and efficient software solutions.

  • Craft high quality, maintainable and testable code. 

  • Improve code quality by participating in and leading code reviews.

  • Ensure testability remains a core consideration throughout the development process, leading design of features that facilitate automated testing.

• Technical problem solving & architecture

  • Identify and resolve complex technical challenges. 

  • Contribute to and influence decisions to improve system performance and reliability. 

  • Advocate for and implement software following Genio’s engineering principles.

• Collaboration & leadership

  • Work closely with Product Managers, UX Designers and engineers to refine requirements to deliver impactful solutions. 

  • Lead and contribute to technical discussions and decision making within the squad. 

  • Foster a culture of open and honest communication, sharing timely updates on progress, issues and blockers with the squad and stakeholders. You can find out more about the recent Engineering away day here. 

  • Foster a fun, safe environment for engineering based upon trust, collaboration and respect. Learn more about maximising team value here.

• Mentorship & knowledge sharing

  • Support less experienced engineers to foster technical growth, through pairing or mentorship. 

  • Share knowledge and advocate for continuous improvement through tech talks, documentation and code reviews. 

  • Contribute to improving engineering processes and team efficiency.

 About you: 

• Expertise in object-oriented and/or functional programming

• Highly proficient in HTML5, CSS, and JavaScript frameworks (TypeScript and React)

• Proficiency in Kotlin for server-side development.

• Experience with mobile application development, especially web-based hybrid apps powered by Capacitor.

• Proficiency in SQL (PostgreSQL) and experience with NoSQL

• Strong understanding of best practices in automated testing, continuous integration, automated deployment, and code quality

• Ability to mentor others, foster trust and advocate for a positive team culture

• Willingness to learn, develop new skills, and support other engineers in continuous improvement

• Strong communication skills, with "passionate views, loosely held" – regularly articulates ideas clearly while remaining open to other perspectives

• Adept at debugging complex issues such as performance issues, memory leaks, and concurrency problems, using a variety of techniques including log analysis, code inspection, and profiling tools

• Proactively leverage AI tools (e.g., code assistants, automated analysis, workflow agents) to enhance development velocity, code quality, and problem-solving effectiveness.

Not every one of the above is essential, but hopefully it gives an idea of what we find useful day to day.

Salary and benefits:

£59,000- £65,000 dependent upon experience 

• 33 days annual leave (Inclusive of bank holidays)

• 3 gifted days off at Christmas

• EMI Share Options Scheme

• Generous individual learning and training allowance 

• Truly flexible hours to suit when you work best 

• Full home working set up and beautiful collaborative office space 

• Free Leeds City Centre office parking

• Nomad working policy with family travel insurance 

• Enhanced 26 weeks maternity and 4 weeks paternity (fully paid)

• 2 volunteering days per year

• Health cash plan (from glasses to massages) 

• 6% employer pension contribution

Location: 

We have a beautiful office space in Leeds and we love it when we get together to collaborate in person. We typically operate a hybrid way of working, however some of our roles support remote working within the UK, if you live more than 50 miles from the office. 

What to expect next: 

We’ll review your application and provide a response within 1 week. Even if it’s not the news you’d hoped for, we appreciate it’s good to know either way. 

Ahead of your interviews you will receive a confirmation email outlining who you’ll be meeting and when, anything you’ll need to prepare in advance and any resources we think you might find helpful. 

If we invite you to meet with us for interview, here’s an overview of what the process will look like: 

1. Screening interview with someone in our Recruitment team (30 minutes). 

2. Technical test via Github; you will have 1 week to complete the test when it suits you best. The test isn’t timed. 

3. Pairing exercise (1 hour 15 minutes) with two of our Engineers.

4. Final stage interview which includes a 1 hour culture and values interview, plus a 30 minute interview around your CV and experience. This will be with our Head of Engineering and other members of the team.