Python Software Engineer

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Octopus Legacy is the place to plan for death and find support after loss.

Having been on our own startup journey, Octopus Group recently bought a stake in our company to supercharge our growth, and now we’re one of the fastest growing companies within the UK’s most exciting group.

With our new brand, the Octopus platform at our disposal and a plan to achieve radical scale we’re transforming the way that people experience the process of planning for and dealing with death.

We’ve assembled a crack team to prepare us for that scale, and you could be the missing piece we’re looking for.

The Role

As a Senior Software Engineer, you will be a key member of our growing engineering team, responsible for designing, building, testing, deploying, and maintaining scalable systems. This is an exciting opportunity to work on a greenfield project, where you’ll have the autonomy to make key decisions on architecture and development, contributing to both back-end services and some front-end components. A key aspect of the role includes working with and integrating Large Language Models (LLMs) into our products, so experience in this area is a plus.

While our preference is for expertise in AWS (using services like Lambda, S3, SNS, SQS, DynamoDB), we are happy to consider candidates with comparable experience in other cloud platforms like GCP or Azure. You will work closely with our Engineering Manager and Lead Developer to deliver high-quality solutions that enhance our product, and collaborate across teams to bring impactful features to life.

As part of a fast-paced startup, you will thrive in an environment that values collaboration, flexibility, and quick iteration while maintaining the balance between speed and quality.

Key Responsibilities

• Lead the design and development of scalable, cloud-native systems, leveraging modern architecture principles such as microservices and serverless frameworks.
• Write maintainable, efficient, and clean code primarily in Python, focusing on performance, scalability, and reliability.
• Build and maintain robust automated testing and CI/CD pipelines to support fast, frequent, and reliable deployments.
• Work closely with cross-functional stakeholders, including product managers, designers, and other engineers, to gather requirements, develop features, and address user needs.
• Drive best practices in development, demonstrating a strong balance between rapid iteration and high-quality output.
• Participate in code reviews, architectural discussions, and continuous improvement initiatives to foster a culture of technical excellence.
• Champion a lean mindset and agile methodologies, contributing to sprint planning, daily stand-ups, and retrospectives.
• Engage with the product and users to understand their needs, ensuring that the solutions delivered align with business goals and enhance the customer experience.

Who Are You?

Must Haves:

• Extensive experience in software development using Python or similar languages.
• Strong cloud experience, ideally with AWS (e.g., Lambda, S3, SNS, SQS, DynamoDB); however, similar expertise in GCP or Azure is also highly valued.
• Proven ability to design, build, and maintain cloud-native applications with a focus on scalability, performance, and reliability.
• Hands-on experience with automated testing practices and CI/CD tools such as CircleCI, Jenkins, Git Hub Actions, or cloud-native solutions like AWS Code Pipeline.
• Ability to thrive in a startup environment, embracing change, iteration, and rapid development cycles.
• Strong understanding of RESTful APIs, with experience in building, consuming, and optimising them.
• Experience or familiarity with OpenAI APIs or other LLMs, with an interest in…