Job description

Join our dynamic business as a Software Development Manager

We're looking for a Software Development Manager to join our diverse and dynamic business working on our Quote & Buy platform and e-commerce sites. We're looking for someone with good technical understanding and analytical skills to lead a vibrant development team and work with business stakeholders and C# .Net core application developers. As our Software Development Manager you'll lead efficient development on a range of bespoke business applications for our major insurance business.

Job Title: Software Development Manager - Quote and Buy

Location: Must be commutable (likely twice a week) to one of the following sites: Tunbridge Wells, Chesterfield, Whitstable or Portsmouth

Competitive Salary and benefits package, based on experience

Overview

• You will lead and manage the development team which work on multiple projects.
• You will liaise with stakeholders in order to agree functional requirements and timescales.
• You will manage the product backlog and organise sprint planning and other meetings.
• The ideal candidate would have prior experience with agile development and a good understanding of technology and leadership skills. A background in insurance or ecommerce would be desirable but not critical.
• You will be facilitating product deliveries and drive quality within the development team using appropriate agile based methodologies and events. Coach, mentor and help the team to be accountable for themselves and for the commitments they make with a focus on continual improvement.
• You will lead and manage the development team which work on multiple projects for the insurance business.
• You will liaise with stakeholders in order to agree functional requirements and timescales.
• You will manage the product backlog and organise sprint planning and other development meetings.
• The ideal candidate would have prior experience with agile development and a good understanding of technology and leadership skills. A background in insurance or ecommerce would be desirable but not critical.

Key Responsibilities

• Lead and support the development team to achieve high standards through building industry leading, robust and innovative software solutions that are fit for purpose.
• Interact with senior business stakeholders to present key design considerations in a digestible format that relate to the overarching non-technical goals.
• This will include identification of functional requirements using formal and informal frameworks as appropriate.
• You will be involved in facilitating discussions between business stakeholders, sometimes conflicting requirements and perspectives and working closely to prioritise workloads including backlogs.

Skills and knowledge

• Strong Insurance Industry awareness
• Attention to detail and high level of accuracy
• Skilled in use of software applications such as Jira, Confluence, MS office suite, including Visio, Draw.IO or similar for documentation and preparing project plans
• Ability to document accurately business requirements to be easily consumable by developers
• Experience of working with DevOps teams using agile frameworks.
• Able to converse with both technical and non-technical team members
• Excellent stakeholder management and communication skills at all levels
• Workshop facilitation skills.
• Solid understanding of development processes, Software Development Lifecycle and User Story creation.
• Experience and knowledge of building and delivering software for cloud platforms, specifically Microsoft Azure, and components such as Service Bus and Web and Function Apps (Serverless functions) would be desirable.
• Any knowledge of insurance quote and policy systems (e.g. CDL, Open GI etc.) would also be useful.

Personal qualities

• Suitable candidates should have experience and demonstrable success in a team lead or supervisory role preferably in a software development team.
• Having a technical or process background with a good understanding of software development principles and methodologies.
• Excellent communication skills are a necessity, with the ability to communicate effectively with both technical and business stakeholders.
• Ability to clearly document business requirements with sufficient detail
• Applicants should have good time management skills and able to manage workloads appropriately.
• Good analytical and decision-making skills are essential to provide good business value and ensure that our products are of high technical standard.