Software Engineering Team Lead

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JOB BAND: D
CONTRACT TYPE: Permanent, Full-time
DEPARTMENT: BBC Studios - Product
LOCATION: London - Hybrid
PROPOSED SALARY RANGE: £76,000 - £85,000 plus London weighting allowance of £5,441 depending on relevant skills, knowledge and experience. The expected salary range for this role reflects internal benchmarking and external market insights.

WE ARE BBC STUDIOS

A globally renowned media company borne of the BBC. We make and distribute the world's most sought-after TV, audio and digital content.

Our ambition is to be the home of the most powerful, entertaining, and inspiring stories for people all around the world.

PURPOSE OF THE ROLE

You will be the technical leader of an empowered engineering team, combining world class engineering excellence with a customer centric mindset. As a hands on Tech Lead, you will set technical direction, coach engineers, and partner with Product and Design to ship meaningful outcomes at high speed and quality.

WHY JOIN THE TEAM

This role sits within the worldwide team, focused on delivering solutions and content for our global (non-UK) audience. The platform is supported by three teams: front-end, CMS/tooling, and back-end systems. We're currently undergoing a transformation to strengthen our agile and engineering practices, with a constant drive to improve. The team is known for being friendly, open, and supportive. is part of the wider Studios Product Group, which manages major BBC brands and content distribution.

YOUR KEY RESPONSIBILITIES AND IMPACT:

Technical Vision & Architecture

• Own the architectural roadmap, ensuring solutions are scalable, reliable, and secure-consistent with leading industry standards.
• Evaluate build vs buy decisions and introduce proven patterns (Microservices, event streaming, service meshes) where they create real product leverage.

Product & Customer Focus

• Collaborate with Product Management to translate problems into measurable outcomes, prioritising impact over output.
• Instrument features for data-driven iteration; ensure we learn from every release.

Team Leadership & Coaching

• Mentor and sponsor engineers, fostering a learning culture inspired by modern engineering principles.
• Lead design reviews, pair programming, and blameless retrospectives, championing psychological safety and continuous improvement.
• Drive operational excellence: automated testing, CI/CD, canary releases, and proactive observability.
• Eliminate toil through automation and rigorous Developer Experience (DevEx) standards.

Cross-Functional Collaboration

• Partner with Data, Security, and SRE teams to align on goals and guardrails.
• Communicate complex technical concepts clearly to executives and non-technical stakeholders.

YOUR SKILLS AND EXPERIENCE

ESSENTIAL CRITERIA:

• A strong track record of managing and leading teams. Driving complex projects from concept to completion.
• Proven success in shipping user-facing products or platforms with significant reach and reliability requirements.
• Strong technical expertise using TypeScript.
• Good understanding of distributed systems, cloud infrastructure (AWS/GCP/Azure), and database technologies (SQL & NoSQL).
• Demonstrated ability to set technical strategy aligned with business outcomes.

DESIRED BUT NOT REQUIRED:

• Familiarity with SVPG principles and empowered product teams.
• Experience with Go, Java, Kotlin, Python.

If you can bring some of these skills and experience, along with transferable strengths, we'd love to hear from you and encourage you to apply.

NEXT STEPS

We appreciate your interest in this position and understand how important this opportunity is to you. Due to high application volume, we may close the application period earlier than expected to ensure high-quality attention to all applicants. Thank you for your understanding.

Please note: If offered this role, the BBC will conduct employment screening checks including reference checks, eligibility to work, and, if applicable, safeguarding and social media checks. Any offer is conditional on these checks being satisfactory.

Disclaimer

This job description outlines the essential characteristics and principal responsibilities of the role, including required skills, knowledge, and experience for satisfactory performance. It is not a complete account of all duties involved.

Redeployment

The BBC is committed to redeploying employees seeking suitable internal opportunities and will prioritize such applications accordingly.

Information at a Glance This is your BBC

At the BBC, you can create and innovate in an inclusive environment while contributing to world-renowned content and the BBC's mission to inform, educate, and entertain.

Learn more about BBC Studios

Life at BBC Studios

• A flexible 35-hour work week with 26 days annual leave (plus bank holidays) and options to buy extra days.
• Defined pension scheme (up to 10% employer contributions).
• Support for caring and parenting, 24/7 remote GP, life assurance, and accident benefits.
• BBC Studios is committed to sustainability with science-based Net Zero targets. Learn more here.
• Opportunities for career development within a purpose-driven culture.

Benefits may vary if joining on a fixed-term contract.

Discover more about life at the BBC and our values in our candidate pack.

You belong

We foster an environment that values every individual's contribution, ensuring all employees feel they belong, thrive, and reach their potential.

We seek a diverse workforce to better reflect our audiences. Applications are welcome from all backgrounds, regardless of age, gender, ethnicity, disability, sexual orientation, gender identity, socio-economic background, religion, or belief.

Learn more about our diversity, inclusion, and belonging strategy.

Disability confident

We are a disability confident employer. If you need adjustments or support during the application or role, contact us at .

BBC Group and Public Services, Broadcasting House, Portland Place, London, W1A 1AA. BBC Studios Distribution Limited, company no: , registered at 1 Television Centre, 101 Wood Lane, London, W12 7FA.