Lead Software Engineer

Job Description

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Role Summary:

Our teams are dedicated to supporting, enhancing and discovering new ways to help our clients achieve lifetime financial security, live healthier lives and connect with us. Through innovation and collaboration, we're striving to deliver best-in-class technology solutions for our digital clients.

We’re building new Sun Life capabilities from the ground up, and as a Lead Software Engineer on our team, you’ll take ideas from napkin sketches to production systems, making the technical calls that matter while shaping how we build, ship, and learn.

This is a hands-on leadership role for an engineer who thrives in ambiguity, moves quickly without sacrificing fundamentals, and cares deeply about creating products people use.

What will you do?

Own products end to end

• Break down product and technical initiatives into well-scoped, sequenced work items
• Define technical approaches, dependencies, and milestones before work starts
• Identify risks early and adjust scope or approach to protect delivery timelines
• Make pragmatic technical decisions that balance speed, quality, scalability, and business impact.
• Own outcomes. If something isn’t working, you fix it.

Build fast, learn faster

• Prototype quickly, launch MVPs, run experiments, and validate ideas with real users.
• Unblock others by resolving architectural or integration challenges
• Be the technical decision-maker when trade-offs are required
• Instrument everything, gather feedback, and iterate based on data.

Lead by building

• Guide the technical direction of the team.
• Establish lightweight architecture and engineering practices that enable speed without chaos.
• Provide clear technical leadership through code reviews, design discussions, and mentorship.

Collaborate across disciplines

• Work directly with product managers, designers, and business stakeholders to turn ambiguous problems into working software.
• Clearly communicate trade offs, risks, and timelines to both technical and nontechnical audiences.
• Work closely with control partners (IT Security, Legal, Risk, Compliance) to ensure compliance and security

Shape the future

• Champion modern engineering practices, tools, and technologies that give us a competitive edge.
• Build reusable components and technical foundations that accelerate future products.

What You Bring:

Engineering Depth and Versatility:

• Minimum 8 years of progressive information technology experience with full application development life cycle and systems integration experience
• Strong experience with Spring Boot, Microservices and API Development
• Proficient with SOAP/XML, REST/JSON
• Experience using DevOps tools (e.g. BitBucket, CDD, Jenkins)
• Understanding of Javascript and jQuery
• Experience with MS 365
• Experience with ServiceNow (SNOW)
• Extensive multi-platform integration experience
• Accessibility, security, or compliance experience in regulated environments
• Cloud and delivery fluency (AWS, CI/CD, Containers, etc…)

Leadership & Communication:

• Proven ability to influence technical direction without relying on hierarchy.
• Experience mentoring engineers and raising the bar through example.
• Strong communication skills. You can explain complex systems simply and persuasively.
• High-Impact Work: Build products that directly shape Sun Life's future, with your code/design reaching real users quickly
• Leadership Opportunity: Lead technical direction, mentor others, and shape the engineering culture of a growing team
• Autonomy and Ownership: Make decisions, drive solutions, and see the direct impact of your work
• Learn and Grow Fast: Exposure to new technologies, business problems, and the full product lifecycle in a compressed timeframe
• Collaborative, Innovative Culture: Work with passionate, talented people who move fast and support each other.

What’s in it for you:

• We’re honoured to be recognized as a 2024 Best Workplaces in Ontario by Great Place to Work® Canada.
• Wellness programs that support the three pillars of your health – mental, physical, and financial
• The opportunity to move along a variety of career paths with amazing networking potential.
• As a hybrid organization, you and your leader use business and Client need to choose where you work, at home or in the office